Football In Basse At A Crossroads

Furu Gomez

Lack of unity is playing a drastic role in Basse's state of football, one of the seven sports zones in the Upper River Region.

The Basse zone is said to be divided when it comes to football administration. This fraction among the youths of the area resulted in two different Nawettan competitions for the local teams. The Basse High Level Field and the Basse Mini-Stadium are the two venues hosting the Nawettan competitions, contrary to previous years when one single committee was in charge of the affairs of running the Nawettan championship for the area.

The Basse Sub- zonal Sports Committee which is tasked with the responsibility of co-coordinating and organising Nawettan competitions in the area is said to be dormant following an alleged scandal involving members of its executive committee who are alleged to have embezzled D78, 000, two years ago.

To shed more light on the state of Basse football, Pointsport caught up with Modou Lamin Sanneh, the Secretary-General of the Basse Sub-zonal Sports Committee. Secretary-General Modou Lamin Sanneh and his committee who were elected into office by village representatives from Basse told Pointsport that the problem facing football in Basse had cropped up following alleged D78, 000 saga.

In his view, "the teams and youths from the area used it as a yardstick to form an Interim Committee which was not even recognised by the Divisional Sports Committee." Concerning the said money, "we were audited by their own people brought forward by them to audit us. At the end of the day, the audit report cleared us of all allegations. So there was nothing like that and since then we are not operating as a committee as some of our members went ahead to join the Interim Committee," Sanneh explained.

On why two committees are conducting Nawettan in the area, Sanneh said it's because of disunity among the youths in the area. "This is the first time of seeing such in Basse, especially URR as all the other zones are operating their activities smoothly, except Basse where you see only two central referees playing for a whole Nawettan season while sidelining other trained referees." "When the self-claimed Interim Committee was formed, we reported it to the Divisional Sports Committee, headed by Furu Gomez who told members of the Interim Committee that the committee is not legal," he stated. The problems faced by the Basse zone could better be solved as, according to Sanneh, in December, the skeletal committee of the Basse Sub- zonal Sports Committee will be heading for congress under the coordination of the Regional Sports Coordinator for the area.

"We hope that this problem will become a thing of the past and we look forward to a successful congress and unity in the area," he added. The Secretary-General who did not hide his intention or lack of interest in holding any position in the upcoming congress, said the Upper River Region is blessed with a Divisional Sports Chairman (Furu Gomez), who personally sponsors almost all the Nawettan competitions in the seven zones. "I have been working with him for the past years and can attest to the fact that Furu Gomez spends about D100, 000 personally every year in URR sport, and has also helped in brining many developments in URR sports, such as the training of football referees. He also helped teams from Basse in the GFA Regional League."

However, Mr. Sanneh elucidated that "We need to support and work with him as there are a few people like him throughout the whole country," he concluded. Pointsport was also informed that the Divisional Sports Committee which is normally elected by Zonal representatives in URR is supposed to hold congress next month, if everything goes well.