PSL to take OUTsurance ref sponsor fight with Safa to lawyers, says chairman Khoza

The dispute between The Premier Soccer League (PSL) and SA Football Association (Safa) over the R50m OUTsurance referees sponsorship is far from over after the PSL resolved on Thursday to take the matter to their lawyers for further clarification.

PSL chairman Irvin Khoza told the media in a press conference in Johannesburg on Thursday that there had been no follow-up meeting with Safa this week to iron out the two bodies’ differences.

He said the PSL’s Board of Governors, in a meeting at Emperors Palace Hotel and Casino on Thursday, had instructed the league’s executive members to take the matter to their lawyers.

Also revealed by Kaizer Chiefs chairman Kaizer Motaung, a member of the PSL’s executive committee, was that Safa and the PSL have not met for over two years to discuss matters of football in their Joint Standing Committee (JSC).

“That JSC has not met for two years and I was deeply disturbed by the way this Safa sponsorship was dealt with,” Motaung said.

“It’s a simply matter which was not dealt with accordingly.”

Khoza alleged that at the exact moment that the Safa sent out a strongly-worded statement on Friday reminding the PSL that, in terms of Fifa statutes, the league was the subordinate in the relationship, the two bodies had been busy in a meeting trying to to resolve the OUTsurance issue.

“We have been quiet in the media because our main aim is to find a solution which is in the best interest of football,” Khoza said.

“For all the years I’ve been in football, I've never read a statement from Safa written in that manner.

“The statement from Safa was sent out while we were still in a meeting with them in order to resolve the matter. That was unfortunate.”

Khoza said the PSL are meeting their lawyers because they have heard that Safa has taken this matter to Fifa to get clarity over referees’ sponsorship.

Of concern to the PSL is that if they do not attend to this matter they could open up themselves to ambush marketing.

“This should have been resolved indoors [between the parties and not publicly] and according to the book,” said Motaung. “We really don’t know what has triggered this on the part of Safa.”

This is a developing story.