SAFA CEO admits regional elections remain unresolved ahead of national polls

A total of 52 regions, represented by three delegates, will be at the SAFA elections in Johannesburg on 12 September to cast the vote for the new leadership, starting with the presidential position. Whilst most of the regions have gone through the elections, in provinces like KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape, there are still issues, as Monyepao confirms.

"We had to, through the membership affairs committee and the chairperson, we had to check the status especially of the elective congresses of the regions and the associate members to ensure that you know all is well on that aspect. There are a number of regions that had issues with their elective congresses. I believe two had elections the past, no three had elections the past weekend," said Monyepao

READ: SAFA presidential race is on: Jordaan and Zungu declared eligible

"One of them was successfully held and there's two that we are awaiting reports on because there were issues with those elections and we do have three other regions that had indicated that their elections were either at the end of this week or next week. So all that information was submitted to the governance committee for that consideration." 

During the Parliamentary Committee of Sport, Arts and Culture this week, SAFA Vice-President Bennet Bailey, who is also a member of the Save Our Soccer (SOS) group behind AmaZulu owner, Sandile Zungu’s, made startling revelations about SAFA NEC members who brought alleged fraudulent vetting forms to the Sarah Baartman regional conference in the Eastern Cape. We posed the question to Monyepao today, about the role of the deployed members in the regional elections. Are they observers or electoral officers.

There have also been questions about the NEC members who oversee the regional elections and double up as electoral officers, and this leads to questions about the legitimacy of the people who are handling the elections. Monyepao says there has to be an independent entity that’s handling the elections.

Monyepao says based on their processes, they must inform all the eligible candidates 14 days before the elections, and that is something they are going to do this weekend.