Four months later still no SAFA referees committee

Four months later, still no SAFA referees committee

Already four months into the new season, the SAFA refereeing department is still operating without a parenting structure, the National Referees Committee (NRC).

SABC Sport understands that this is also holding back a lot of things in this department.

The NRC, a subcommittee of the SAFA National Executive Committee (NEC), was supposed to have been appointed when the standing committees of the new NEC were introduced after the first meeting of this newly elected leadership on the 17th of September.

Two months later, there has been no NRC and SAFA CEO Tebogo Motlanthe has the reasons.

"Look it™s at final stages and I think that event we will also be saying, this is the chairperson and this. It™s just the final consultation, there are letters which have gone out for people to confirm if they will be serving in committees once that process is done it will be able to announce, said Motlanthe.

The refereeing department at SAFA is guided by the NRC on several issues, with three sub-committees below it¦the Technical Committee, Review Committee, and the Appointments Committee.

Again SABC Sport understands that the newly envisaged NRC has former FIFA referee Jerome Damon as the Chairperson with former NRC Chair Nastasia Tsichlas as the Deputy.

This is where the problem is, as FIFA sent out a directive that the NRC should only be composed of former referees and no politicians as Motlanthe explain

"FIFA rules says it must be former elite referees but we are saying you can™t, a child does not stand up today and start waking, you crawl," Motlanthe went on.

"There are aspects which needs to be balanced of course it™s a first step and I need to complement the current executive because that rule has been there for many years and it has been ignored but this executive has committed to it, they say let™s start 50-50 and time go on we get people out and get only elite referees.

By Velile Mnyandu