Kurt ES Okraku becomes new GFA president until 2023, Ghana adopt 18-club league
Ghana have been without football for more than a years now due to non-existing of football governing body in the country. The football governing body known as the Ghana Football Association (GFA) suffered a temporary collapse after football actors in the country including but not limited to referees, club administrators and FA officials indulged in bribery scandals in the footballing arena.
After evidence against him through “Anas Expose” or “No. 12”, Mr. Kwesi Nyantakyi, the former president of the GFA resigned leading to the dissolution of the GFA embodiment in 2018 and affecting football in Ghana in general.
Like it had ever happened in other countries where a football Association seems not to be working, FIFA/CAF introduced a short term panacea- “Normalization Committee”- to ensure in general terms jeopardized football gets back to its best in those countries and Ghana’s cases is no exception.
One important step the committee found necessary to achieving this general goal is to establish a new GFA, and as one of its core mandates- thus, to act as the Election Committee in electing new GFA president and Executive Council members- the NC organized 2019 GFA Elections on 18th, 24th and 25th October 2019 to select new members to the Executive Council and president of Ghana Football Association.
For the presidency position, six members out of the initial seven, Fred Pappoe, Nana Yaw Amponsah, Amanda Clinton, George Afriyie, Kurt Okraku and Lawyer George Ankomah were certified to contest the position after passing through the necessary recognized procedures.
This means one candidate, a popular one in Ghana football for that matter, Wilfred Kwaku Osei was disqualified to contest the GFA Presidency after failing the integrity test during the vetting process of the elections.
Palmer by popular name filed a request to the Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) to put hold on election proceedings until his disqualification is looked into and resolved. However, few hours to the Extraordinary Elective Congress, CAS rejected Palmer’s appeal.
In statement released by CAS on Thursday 24th October read, “The application for provisional and conservatory measures filed by Wilfred Kwaku Osei on 14th October 2019 in the matter of CAS 2019/A/6517 Wilfred Kwaku Osei vs Ghana Football Association is rejected”.
Detailed Results of Election
First Round Standings
| Candidates No. Votes % |
| Total Expected Votes 120 100 |
| Kurt E. Okraku 44 37.28 |
| George Afriyie 40 33.89 |
| Fred Pappoe 06 05.10 |
| Amanda Clinton 00 00.00 |
| Nana Yaw Amponsah 27 22.88 |
| George Ankomah Mensah 00 00.00 |
| Total Votes Cast 118 98.00/TEV |
| Total valid votes 117 99.00/ TVC |
| Spoilt votes 1 1.00 |
General rule: A candidate must pull 50% + 1 (equivalent to 61 total valid votes) vote before he/she can be declared as a winner of the president of GFA.
Note 1: By the general rule no candidate won the race, so a second round was needed to decide who becomes GFA president.
Note 2: Going into the second round, three candidates who recorded the least vote counts, Amanda Clinton, George Ankomah Mensah and Fred Pappoe redrew from the race
Three contestants entered into the second round
Second Round Standings
| Candidates No. Votes % |
| Total Expected Votes 120 100 |
| Kurt E. Okraku 59 50.00 |
| George Afriyie 43 36.44 |
| Nana Yaw Amponsah 16 13.60 |
| Total Votes Cast 118 98.00/TEV |
| Total Valid Votes 118 100.00/ TVC |
| Spoilt votes 00 00.00 |
Note 1: By the general rule no candidate won the race in the second round, so a third round was needed to decide who become the GFA president.
Note 2: Two candidates from the second round, Nana Yaw Amponsah and George Afriyie redrew going into the third round. This meant Kurt Okraku was the only remaining candidate for the third round
Third round Standings
| Candidates No. Votes % |
| Total expected votes 120 100 |
| Kurt E. Okraku xx xx
Yes 93 78.81 No 21 17.79 |
| Total Votes Cast 118 98.00/TEV |
| Total Valid Votes 114 96.61/TVC |
| Spoilt votes 4 |
After third round of vote casting, Kurt Okraku recorded 93 (78.81%) of total votes, therefore making him the new GFA president. It is 62 years down the line following the establishment of the GFA and Kurt Okraku is the 24th president of the noble Association.
The 18-club league
Ghana was noted for 16-club league before coming for the GFA Extraordinary Congress on Friday. The Normalization Committee had proposed a new development that would see a move from 16-club to 18-club league for the 2019-2020 season.
After series of deliberation on the proposal, the congress have accepted to involve 18 teams in the Ghana Premier League for the upcoming season. Though no new date was set for the commencement of Ghana Premier League, the NC ordered the new elect Executive members to set date.
The then ongoing 2018-2019 league was also officially cancelled by the congress, meaning all the sixteen clubs will part-take in the new season together with the inclusion of Accra Great Olympic and King Faisal who had initially taken the FA to court.
Olympics placed an injunction during start of the 2017/ 2018 Ghana Premier League season after a case they presented against Bechem United for fielding an unqualified player was thrown out by the FA.
They advocated for a points-deduction for Bechem in line with the FA’s statutes. The deduction would have saved Olympics from relegation.
The FA, at that time however, said the case had been filed outside the stipulated 3-day window prescribed in the statutes. Subsequently, Olympics took the issue to the law courts where they lost the case ultimately.
In King Faisal case, they suffered relegation in 2014 but they sought legal redress, arguing that Aduana Stars FC had failed to pay a fine and thus, needed to be punished.
King Faisal lost at the GFA’s Disciplinary and Appeals Committee. It later went to the law courts to have the FA punish Aduana Stars by deducting points; a situation which would have saved Faisal from relegation.
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