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The Trinidad and Tobago Football Association (TTFA) will hold its first presidential election in over four years on Saturday 13 April 2024, according to correspondence from the Robert Hadad-led Fifa-appointed Normalisation Committee.
The suggested date was proposed to members two weeks ago but is now confirmed by the Bureau of the Fifa Council, which is headed by Fifa president Gianni Infantino.
As a result of the election date, the Normalisation Committee, which runs the TTFA, now has its third—and possibly final—extension until 30 April 2024.
“In order to allow the normalisation committee to fulfil the final tasks of its mandate (that is, to organise and conduct elections of a new TTFA Executive Committee for a four-year mandate),” stated a dispatch from interim Fifa general secretary Mattias Grafström, “the Bureau decided on 12 February 2024 to extend the mandate of the normalisation committee until 30 April 2024 at the latest.”
The upcoming TTFA election will be the first conducted under Fifa’s controversial new amendments, in which candidates must run by slate (comprising nine persons) and members are compelled to vote for an entire slate.
Article 30.4: “[…] Each member shall support one slate only. If a member supports more than one slate, none of its expressions of support shall be considered valid.”
Candidates must be proposed by at least five members to run for office. The TTFA membership comprises 32 members at present with 57 delegates between them. (For instance, 18 TTPFL clubs have 36 votes)
Thus far, Eastern Football Association (EFATT) president Kieron Edwards, Southern Football Association (SFA) president Denis Latiff, and Veteran Footballers Foundation (VFOTT) president Selby Browne have all indicated their interest in running for the presidency.
Miscellaneous Marketing director Sham Mohammed is weighing up his options and might choose to run as part of a slate rather than at the helm. And TTPFL CEO Colin Wharfe told Wired868 that he is “actively considering it and will make a firm decision this week”.
The Normalisation Committee also announced that the electoral process will be overseen by “three independent persons […] of the highest calibre with excellent reputations for being fair and methodical”.
(Copyright RC Social Justice TT)
The appointed persons are: Dr Terrence Farrell, a renowned economist and former deputy governor of the Central Bank; Elton Prescott SC, an attorney and former independent senator with extensive experience for the Trinidad and Tobago Olympic Committee (TTOC); and Dr Justin Koo, a senior lecturer and deputy dean at UWI.
Incidentally, Prescott also served as a TTFA electoral committee member in 2015 while Koo was a member of the electoral committee in 2019.
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The process and eligibility requirements are so outdated. Why not open up the Presidency to the general public? Looking at the state of T&T football over the past decade, one has to question if dipping into the current TTFA well is the right option.