Gallants could face action over detained employees

Marumo Gallants' Rufus Matsena

Tuesday Apr 04, 2023. 15:00

The South African Football Association (SAFA) is waiting on a report from their head of department before deciding whether action will be taken against Marumo Gallants.

Two of the DStv Premiership club’s employees, Dina Dhlomo and Rufus Matsena, have been detained in Libya for more than two weeks after their CAF Confederation Cup clash with Al Akhdar in Benghazi.

Bahlabane Ba Ntwa are alleged to owe Libyan businessman Ali Elzargha money for helping them with the purchase of tickets for their flight to North Africa as well as arrangements for the matchday 5 encounter.

The Limpopo outfit are in the process of resolving the issue and have been ensured that Dhlomo and Matsena are safe, with SAFA chief executive Tebogo Motlanthe confirming that the South African embassy were instructed to take care of them.

However, Motlanthe expressed his surprise that Gallants chose to work with someone outside the purview of FIFA, while adding that SAFA doesn’t meddle with financial issues.

“Look, I think for me it is to await the full report from the HOD then I will tell you if they have brought either our name or whoever into disrepute and this is what we can do,” Motlanthe told Sowetan.

“But for now, it would be like jumping the gun because we are waiting for HOD. It is not our issue, we don’t intervene with them, CAF normally gives them the money so they meet all their financial obligations.

“First, when Marumo play we send an HOD who goes with them, but of course we don’t get into the finances of a team to say ‘who paid who’.

“But something that amazes me is that they have appointed someone who is not a FIFA agent. It is like a buddy-buddy relationship. What we have done, we’ve written to the [SA] embassy to ensure that individuals who are stuck there are at least taken care off.

“So, the only thing we could do from our side was to write to the embassy because these are the citizens of the country and they are now stuck in Libya. But the club has said they are resolving issues they had with a person who was assisting them.”