Namibia Football Association (NFA) secretary general, Franco Cosmos, has said suspended Namibian Football Association president, Ranga Haikali, remains suspended and FIFA does not have the mandate to lift the suspension.
Cosmos said this on Thursday at Soccer House, while responding to questions from the media on Haikali’s claim that his suspension had been lifted.
This comes after Haikali called a press conference and announced that FIFA has lifted his suspension and that he was going to call for an urgent meeting with NFA executive committee members to resolve matters that led to his suspension in August this year.
Haikali is accused of corruption for allegedly instructing the NFA secretariat to organise a contract for IT services with a company in which he is a shareholder and organising a contract with Africa Personnel Services to provide fumigation services to NFA, where he is also a shareholder, among others.
During the press briefing, he told reporters that he wishes to put aside his differences with the NFA executive committee members for the sake of football in order to avoid the country being suspended by FIFA now that his suspension had been lifted by the same organisation.
“I had a meeting with FIFA on Tuesday and another meeting with all 11 NFA executive committee members where the emphasis was put on unity and diversity. It was confirmed in no uncertain terms that I am still the president of NFA, and in that regard we are advised and reminded that as leaders in football, we need to take the interest of football seriously and we should not bring football into disrepute,” said Haikali.
However, when approached for comment, Cosmos said Haikali is still suspended as far as he knows, because the NFA executive committee has not pronounced itself on the matter yet.
“Yes, the president is still suspended. He was here and tried to talk to me but I didn’t entertain him. I asked him for a letter from FIFA that says his suspension had been lifted but he couldn’t provide it. FIFA does not have the mandate to lift his suspension, only the executive committee can do that,” said Cosmos.
Source: The Namibia Press Agency
