Monday 18th January, 2009

The first ever football stakeholders meeting for the Solomon Islands Football Federation (SIFF) was a day of revelations which saw participants enlightened on the funding procedures the national football body is operating under. Several presentations and many questions were raised but the highlights were how funds from FIFA and the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) is received, spent and reported by SIFF.

The one day workshop was attended by more than 30 participants including members of the media who covered the proceedings throughout the day. FIFA was represented by Glenn Turner whose presentation gave an insight into how FIFA money is spent on projects. Greg Larsen, the OFC Deputy General Secretary, also presented details about the role of OFC and the funding that SIFF receives from OFC.

One of the greatest myths about SIFF and FIFA funding for local projects was cleared away when Glenn Turner explained that all FIFA money for projects does not go to SIFF but does directly to the contractor. ‘FIFA does not give money to SIFF to build these projects, FIFA directly spends this money,’ Turner said. ‘SIFF only receives the finished product.’

Participants also learned from Turner that SIFF was one of only 11 FIFA Members Associations in the world that received FIFA Goal Project I as a pilot project. ‘Of these 11 only 8 associations were able to complete their Goal I Project projects and SIFF was one of them,’ Glenn Turner said. FIFA Goal I Project was the funding of the upgrade of the Lawson Tama stadium complete in 2001.

Greg Larsen made another clarifying statement when he said that SIFF is meeting its commitments for reporting to OFC about its finances. Larsen also explained to the participants that money received by SIFF is tightly controlled by regulations which have to agreed to be before the money is given to Member Associations SIFF included. ‘Money given to SIFF has to be accounted for, audited and reported to OFC,’ Larsen clarified.

Many questions were raised in the open forum session in the afternoon which SIFF and the representatives from FIFA and OFC answered.

It was in the question session that SIFF revealed that it costs $950 000-00 a year to maintain and keep Lawson Tama and the SIFF Academy operational. The SIFF General Secretary, Eddie Ngava, explained that while SIFF receives this infrastructure for free from FIFA, FIFA does not fund the maintenance and operational costs. The maintenance of these facilities, Lawson Tama and SIFF Academy, are expected to be funded by money generated from the facilities.

Eddie Ngava went on to explain that since 1999 SIFF receives USD$250 000-00 of funds from the OFC to support its annual budget. This is in spite of the fact that SIFF now has more staff and more facilities to maintain meaning that more has to be squeezed out of the same amount each year.  

The workshop was closed late in the afternoon with the participants agreeing for proposals to be formulated from the conclusions made in the workshop. The participants will sign the proposals and SIFF will communicate them to offices of relevant stakeholders for consideration.