PSL to boycott Safa congress, seeks urgent audience with Kodwa, Motsepe

Simmering tensions between the Premier Soccer League (PSL) and the South African Football Association (Safa) have boiled over again.

The PSL has announced it will boycott the Safa workshop/indaba on Friday and Saturday and ordinary Safa congress on Sunday and will seek an urgent meeting with sports minister Zizi Kodwa and Confederation of African Football (Caf) president Patrice Motsepe.

The PSL said its decision to not attend the Safa events was taken after its executive committee (exco) “discussed the agenda circulated by Safa” at an exco meeting on Thursday.  

“The monthly meeting of the PSL executive committee was held on Thursday, rather than on the last Thursday of the month due to the celebration of Freedom Day,” the PSL said.

“The executive committee discussed the agenda circulated by Safa for a workshop/indaba of the association’s regional members set for April 21 to 22, which is to be followed by an ordinary Safa congress on Sunday.

“The executive committee unanimously resolved that the PSL would not attend the workshop/indaba or the ordinary congress.

“The executive committee delegation will seek an urgent audience with the minister of sports, arts and culture, president of Caf and stakeholders that support professional football and then call an extraordinary meeting of the [PSL] board of governors on the matter.”

The PSL’s move follows wide-ranging statements made by Safa president Danny Jordaan, CEO Tebogo Motlanthe and technical director Walter Steenbok at a breakfast meeting with media on Wednesday.

Among issues discussed, the Safa leaders indicated they will push for the association to implement Caf club licensing rules, especially those pertaining to minimum qualification requirements for coaches, on PSL clubs.

They said Safa wants to stipulate that coaches be required to have a Caf A licence to be eligible to coach in the top flight DStv Premiership and B licence for the second tier Motsepe Foundation Challenge.

Jordaan, Motlanthe and Steenbok also said they will seek a meeting with the PSL to discuss the format and age limit of the DStv Diski Challenge (DDC) reserve league.

They said some of those issues would be on the agenda of the Safa indaba and congress.

The PSL and Safa have historically had a poor relationship and the league has been reluctant to bend to the rulings of the mother body.

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