The former Minister of Youth and Sports, Mohammed Muntaka Mubarak, has described managers of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) as "official looters" of state coffers. According to him the biggest benefactor of the entire budget of the Sports Ministry is the GFA at the expense of the other 34 sporting disciplines under the ministry. The NDC Member of Parliament for the Asawasi Constituency in the Ashanti Region made the remarks during a "thank you and solidarity tour of the various zongo communities in the region following his party's victory in the 2008 general elections, as well as the support he enjoyed from the people in the wake of the financial malfeasance accusations levelled against him. "If Ghanaians know about the kind of massive rot in the sector, especially the GFA, they will cry aloud for an instant revolution into how things are done. In fact, positive defiance maybe", he said. "The GFA has formed a strong clique to champion its nefarious course in office, but I believe in my heart of hearts that, Insha Allah, at the very appointed time the 'beans will spill and the truth will come out regardless of how long it takes. They will be exposed", Mubarak predicted. "Look, when I came to office I noticed that the budget for Black Stars games were too huge for the nation to bear, for instance, the FA presented a list of 38 players and officials each of whom was entitled to 8,000 US dollars for a World Cup qualifier at home and 10,000 dollars for away games". Apart from the bonuses, each of them earned 100 dollars as per diem in camp and putting the figures together I thought it was too much for a third world country like Ghana to pay", he explained. "Not basically because of the players, but why would the officials, i.e., team doctor, masseur, FA officials and even a ball boy take the same incentives as was presented to me on paper. So I queried it at a meeting with the FA president who explained it, and eventually we settled on appreciable cut downs," he revealed. He said that decision did not go down well with the affected members of the team, some of whom resorted to sending death-threatening text messages to deter him, but he did not budge because he was bent on ensuring the common interest of the nation. "Each official made 8,000 dollars for the Ghana-Benin game in Kumasi, 10,000 dollars each for the games in Sudan and Mali respectively. These sums come to 28,000 US dollars each. Multiply that figure by the current dollar rate and Ghanaians will notice that it's over 400 million old Ghana cedis", Mubarak stressed. The former Sports minister called on Ghanaians to reflect on the figures involved regarding how much each official of the GFA earned after the three World Cup matches played so far and imagine if it was reasonable to pay such monies to them. "This is what I describe as official looting of state coffers," he emphasised. "How can a third world country spend such huge sums of money on officials of its national team, not players. How can Ghana, and for that matter the state alone, spend like this and also build a better economy for the people at the same time?”he questioned. "These expenditures are even setback when the GFA raises over 2 million dollars in cash alone from sponsorship in a year and nobody knows what they do with that kind of cash", he lamented. He said during his stay at the Ministry, he noticed that if the kind of decisions that put him in that trouble were not taken, the so-called lesser-known sports would never see development and progress. "Given the opportunity a million times, I will take the same decisions that are aimed at reviving the rest of the 34 disciplines of the ministry and also saving the nation cash. "How can a travel agent for all these years monopolise the travel arrangements in this country at the expense of other Ghanaian travel agents?" "One day when the figures are made available to Ghanaians on the cost of air tickets for players of the national teams the nation will marvel", he sounded. He said he opened tender and other travel agencies brought competitive rates which saved the nation hundreds of thousands of dollars. "Those who hatched and masterminded the accusations think they have won, but they have not. Insha Allah I will be back", Mubarak assured. He reiterated the need for a massive house-cleaning exercise at the Youth and Sports Ministry, especially the GFA, to check the rot so as to save the nation the huge wastage. Hon. Mubarak took advantage of the long break of parliament to tour all the Zongo communities in the Ashanti Region where the leaders of those communities took turns to encourage and advise him, as well as assure him of their unflinching support. Source: Graphic Sports/Ghana