Three national federations fall foul of transformation targets
The annual Eminent
Persons Group (EPG) Report has recently been received by the Minister of Sport and
Recreation and has shown that national federations for swimming, hockey and
cricket have failed in achieving their stipulated targets and potentially face
a number of penalties.
The 19 sporting federations had to submit their reports to the EPG and now that the Minister has had time to make his assessment he will be meeting with the individual federations to discuss their findings.
Mr Nathi Mthetwa said in a media statement on Wednesday that federations need to put transformation at the top of their agendas going forward.
“Federations should take the issue of transformation seriously as it is a non-negotiable,” the minister said.
“As the minister of this portfolio, I would be failing the people of South Africa and violating our constitution if I fail to act decisively against sport transformation delinquents.
“For those federations that achieve less than 50% of self-set targets one or more of the penalties may apply.”
These penalties that the minister refers to are the suspension or withdrawal of government funding, the revoking of the federations bid to host international competition, the withdrawal of the right to award national colours or the withdrawal of the recognition of a national federation.
It was explained in their media statement that hockey and swimming failed in that they did not meet their own self-set barometer targets.
They now have to present to the ministry reasoning for why they should not have at least one of the penalties imposed against them.
Cricket has fared slightly better in that they did achieve 70% of their self-set barometer although they fell short in African representation.
These three federations have until this weekend to give the minister convincing reasoning as to why they should not be penalised.
The minister also mentioned in his statement that he had met with a number of past players about the allegations of systemic racism in the federation and he and Cricket South Africa will meet in the near future to discuss a way forward.
