Safa presidential election postponed until further notice

The South African Football Association (Safa) has officially postponed its elective congress which was set to take place on Saturday, March 24, 2018. 

Safa took the decision to postpone the presidential election on Tuesday following a meeting between Dr Danny Jordaan and national executive committee members.

The election had been hanging in the balance since withdrawal of the Indepedent Electoral Commission (IEC) from overseeing the entire process two weeks ago. Safa initially threatened to sue the IEC for dumping them. 

The country's FA has hired a team to correct some of the errors made which would have compromised the credibility of the election itself.

The decision to postpone the election will somehow vindicate former PSL general manager Andile 'Ace' Ncobo and his team, who consistently called on the elective congress to be called off. 

The congress was initially scheduled for September 2018, but it was brought forward due to Bafana Bafana's failure to qualify for the Fifa World Cup in Russia. 

However, a group of individuals which included Ncobo and former Safa vice-president Chief Mwelo Nonkonyana, felt the process wasn't fair towards members intending to run for the position of president as there was little time for them to campaign. 

Just over a week ago, Safa announced that current president Dr Danny Jordaan will be elected unopposed after Ncobo, who initially received a single nomination, decided to turn it down. 

Cosafa president Phillip Chiyangwa was last week in the country on behalf of Fifa to intervene following Ncobo's scathing press conference where he called for Jordaan's resignation along with that of CEO Dennis Mumble. 

An 'agreement' was reached by the two parties in Chiyangwa's presence, and while Safa maintained that the elective congress would go ahead as planned, Ncobo insisted that there was never going to be a congress. 

Below is Safa's official statement: 

The South African Football Association (SAFA) National Executive Committee (NEC) met on Tuesday, 20 March 2018 to discuss issues surrounding the upcoming SAFA Elective Congress.

The NEC unanimously agreed to postpone the Elective Congress that was scheduled for Saturday, 24 March in order to address any issues that may impact the credibility of the Congress.

The NEC meeting also resolved the following:

• Postponing the elections would give the new Electoral Committee (EC) enough time to thrash out all compliance matters.
• The EC must finalise all matters pertaining to the elections.
• All Regions who have not fully completed their electoral process must do so urgently.
• A Congress should be called up urgently to notify members about the above resolutions.
• Individuals who take football cases to the courts of law must be reported to FIFA in line with the world football governing body and, where appropriate, SAFA should recommend that such individuals receive worldwide bans as per FIFA statutes.
• Chief Mwelo Nonkonyana who lost his case in the courts on Tuesday, 20 March 2018 should be banned for life and that SAFA should start processes to recoup all money as a result of these court cases. The amounts run into millions of Rand.
• SAFA writes a full report for FIFA on the above recommendations and on the way forward with regards to the elections.

The new date for the elections will be announced shortly.