Black Stars appearance fee must be performance-based
The usually controversial appearance fee for the senior national team, the Black Stars, must be based on performance, former President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) Mr Fred Pappoe, has said.
Speaking at the maiden eSport Summit held in Accra on Wednesday, he said, having a fixed appearance fee for the team without linking it to performance would not serve the interest of the nation at large.
“Appearance fee must be an incentive for performance to motivate the team to do better. The better a team performs, the more they get,” he stressed.
Organised by eTV Ghana, the summit was under the theme “Financing the national team; the bonus and appearance fee structure and its sustainability.”
The event brought together football administrators and renowned resource persons to discuss the best practices and structures of renumeration for the national teams going into the World Cup in Qatar.
According to Mr Pappoe, players would be motivated to advance to the next stage of tournaments once they were assured of more funds as they progressed.
“Otherwise, we would ways have the situation where the team would just go and be eliminated in the first round and still walk away with a hefty appearance fee,” he stated.
He recommended that the appearance fee of $100,000 as received in Ghana’s last participation in the World Cup, be reviewed.
“In my view, it is a little too high considering what the country would be getting; so there must be a discussion around it so see if it could be reduced a bit,” he stated.
In determining the quantum of the appearance fee, he said stakeholders including the players, the GFA and the government must be engaged to discuss and agree to avoid players revolt as witnessed in the past.
“The timing must be right and the leaders must be trusted as well as there should be adequate representation of all parties,” he stressed.
On his part, Mr Moses Foh Amoaning – who was also on the panel, reiterated that stakeholders’ engagement as recommended by the 2014 Commission of Enquiry, was very crucial in determining appearance fee for the Black Stars.
“Let us move beyond talking to implementing recommendations from the Commission which explicitly provided a guideline for appearance fee.
“We should learn the right lessons and not try to reinvent the wheel. Go back to the underlying policy framework which is in the Commission of Enquiry report,” he stressed.
He said now was the time for negotiations on appearance fee to begin as the World Cup was only about two months away.
Other panelists including former Black Stars player, Emmanuel Agyemang Badu, and Marketing expert Neil Armstrong-Mortagbe, also shared their views on the topic.
BY MICHAEL D.ABAYATEYE
