17 Dec 2015

Premier league clubs face the risk of being kicked out of the lucrative league and Botswana Football Association (BFA) structures should they fail to comply with CAF club licencing requirements, come August 1, 2016.

Requirements want clubs to submit audited financial statements, development teams and contract of lease agreement with stadiums of their choice.

Part of the requirement is that the license applicants must have approved stadiums available for playing inter-club competitions that provide spectators and media representatives with comfortable space, as well as having suitable training facilities that would help players improve technical skills.

A stadium must also have among others certification, control room, spectators area, first aid rooms and doping control rooms.

CAF club licensing committee member, Suzgo Nyirenda, who conducted a seminar in Gaborone this week, told clubs to desist from politics and power struggle and ensure that they meet the requirements.

The objective of the licensing, he said, was to promote and improve the quality and level of all football aspects in Africa;

 He said the club licensing would also ensure that clubs have the appropriate infrastructure, knowledge and application in respect of management and organisation, adapting and improving the sporting infrastructure of clubs.

Nyirenda further said the other objective of club licensing was to allow parallel development and comparison among clubs by ensuring the necessary compliance in terms of financial, sporting, legal, administrative and infrastructure criteria.

He said the ball was now in the hands of BFA and BPL to ensure that Botswana complied with the club licensing system.

“It is not a threat its either you are in or out and we need to work together as BFA, BPL and the media to drive this project. Time for politics is gone. We have seen the structures and deficiencies and we have been able to give you direction where possible”, he said.

Nyirenda, however, was confident that come August, all the premier league teams would be up to date with compliance, adding that BFA had a good leadership which was willing to take the game of football to another level.

Club licensing, he said, was a yard stick that will check if Botswana was ready for professionalism of football. 

CAF sporting criteria instructor, Honor Janza, said he was happy that the Botswana Football Association was ready to change the mind-set in the development of the game.

He said it was the responsibility of sport stakeholder to ensure that they take “a bull by its horn” so that Africa as a continent can develop because the club licensing was not only for Botswana but also for the continent.

“We all celebrate when we see an Africa team in the World cup, winning the World cup by an African team is not a dream but a reality as long as we do things right and we put the right people in the right place and qualified personnel,” he said.

 Janza told clubs not to take club licensing as a threat but an opportunity to drive the development of the game given that it has a potential to yield good results.

CAF infrastructure criteria instructor Kawemba Byemba said club licensing was the only way forward for the development of the game in Africa.

“It’s either we do club licensing if we love the game or we leave it, and since we love the game, there is no way out, we need to go with club licensing and that’s the only solution for us to move to the next level,” he said.

Furthermore, he implored, BFA and BPL not to be hesitant in encouraging clubs to comply as that is the only way to take Botswana football to greater heights adding that the life of football lies with club licensing. Ends