Former deputy sports minister, Hon Joseph Yamin has blasted new Youth and Sports Minister Mustapha Ussif over the $25 budget allocated to the Black Stars for their 2021 AFCON campaign as well as the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifiers.
The President organized a breakfast meeting at the Jubilee House on Monday in conjunction with the Sports Ministry where Chief Executive Officers of state-owned enterprises and corporate Ghana were there to solicit for funds for the Black Stars.
He promised the government will provide $10million and urged corporate Ghana to help the Black Stars with the remaining $15million.
Since the announcement, there has been a lot of backlash from Ghanaians about that by a wrong priority and a wrong move.
The latest to add his voice is Hon Joseph Yamin who do not understand why the Sports minister is justifying Ghana’s huge quoted amount for Cameroon 2021 AFCON and the World Cup in 2022.
“For the minister to come out and say playing African Cup of Nations is difficult and requires extra money, I don’t get it,” he said in an interview with Kumasi-based Adehyeɛ FM.
“He’s sick in his head, that new Sports minister is sick in his head, excuse me to say there’s something worrying his mind,” he furiously said.
“The minister should rather be interested in getting money to run the ministry not to go and play in African”.
“I’m not saying this money isn’t good and won’t help the national team but what I’m saying is that this money to be raised is going to the GFA’s coffers and would be used for football only which it’s not going to help the ministry in any way but only the football administration”. He explained
“It is sad that the minister is not interested in getting money to run the ministry who has nothing in it’s account”.
“If the Minister can help raise $15m which is almost Gh₵80m from the cooperate bodies for only football, for that matter Black Stars, why don’t he raise that money for the ministry to run all sporting activities”?
“Never true money can win us the AFCON trophy, money alone can’t do, there are a lot of factors to be considered”.
“Selecting the right players for the competition, proper preparation for the competition, better technical team who can make the right decision when the going gets tough and above all, luck. These win a trophy, not millions of dollars or cedis as they think”. He revealed.
“The money quoted for the Black Stars is not bad but I think it’s an avenue to get something into their pockets”.
When asked why every government put monies in the Black Stars despite winning notthing for the nation, he said…
“Every government want the Black Stars to redeem its image in African football again that is why they keep pushing money there”
“No one should compare our $3m to their quoted $25m please, we used $3m as a budget for the 2014 world cup which it’s appearance fee alone was $3m so we shouldn’t compare them in anyway”.
