Safa drops the ball again as Banyana Banyana squad downs tools over unpaid dues

It is unfortunate yet unsurprising that Banyana Banyana have once again butted heads with the South African Football Association (Safa) ahead of participation in a major tournament. On Saturday, 28 June, SABC Sport reported that the Banyana Banyana players had downed tools in Morocco, over a financial stand-off with Safa.

The disagreement stems from unpaid match fees by Safa after the team played preparation friendlies ahead of their Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) title defence in the continental competition, which kicks off on 5 July.

South Africa’s senior women’s soccer side faced Malawi in a double-header back in April. More recently, the team tussled against Botswana and Zambia as part of fine-tuning their performances for a challenging defence of the Wafcon title they won in 2022.

Sit-in protest

Displeased with how they have been treated by Safa in the build-up to the tournament, the players (who arrived in Morocco on Wednesday) resorted to staging a sit-in. They boycotted training with the hopes of capturing the attention of the Safa hierarchy. The extreme action has worked.

Speaking to journalists following the conclusion of Safa’s ordinary congress in Sandton on Saturday, the federation’s vice-president, Linda Zwane, labelled the incident a “minor issue” and said it has been resolved.    

“It’s a minor issue. It’s an issue of the payments of the previous games they played, particularly the Malawi games. The association then undertook to address that particular matter and there’s agreement that has been reached with the team, through their captain,” Zwane stated.  

“As far as we’re concerned that particular matter is now buried and the association has made a commitment towards [paying the players], making sure that players continue with their preparations. We want them to perform very well in the tournament and the reports we are getting is that the team is back in training,” the vice-president said.

Failing finances

Of course, Safa’s current financial woes are well documented, having shot to the centre of the public eye in December 2024 when the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture gave the South African soccer governing body an advance of R5-million. This was from the annual government grant the association receives.

This advance has not helped Safa much though, as reports of delayed salary payments at their Nasrec headquarters have been a regular feature in the news. At the beginning of June, Safa appeared before the parliamentary oversight committee for sport, arts and culture.

During this appearance the federation painted a grim picture of its finances, with Safa’s chief financial officer, Gronie Hluyo, telling the committee members that the association’s current liabilities exceed its assets by R141-million.

Hluyo said the reasons for this deficit included the adoption of gender parity policies for the senior teams, Bafana Bafana and Banyana Banyana. He said that despite this commitment from Safa, the limited sponsors approaching them were primarily interested in backing the men’s team.

Hluyo stands accused of fraud within Safa, alongside the federation’s president, Danny Jordaan, and public relations company boss Trevor Neethling. The chief of finance told Parliament that Safa’s cash flow struggles were also due to the organisation battling to attract sponsors owing to regular negative publicity surrounding it.

Also addressing the media after the conclusion of the Safa congress, CEO Lydia Monyepao alluded to Safa’s dire finances being the reason for the outstanding payments to players.      

“The disagreement arose in terms of the payment dates with regards to the bonuses. We have since addressed that matter; we know that we have a commitment to the players in terms of after a friendly match, we give [them their money after] 30 days. But us as a federation, where we are right now in terms of financial performance, was covered extensively in the congress,” Monyepao said.

History repeats itself

This is the second successive major tournament where the Banyana Banyana players have been forced to confront Safa for not valuing them enough. Ahead of their historic run to the 2023 World Cup’s round of 16, the team clashed with the federation over a number of issues.

Those included the poor-quality stadium at which the African champions were expected to play. The players raised their concerns about this and the high risk of injury posed by playing at Tsakane Stadium – particularly before the World Cup.

There was also a financial factor in that pre-World Cup stand-off. It took the Motsepe Foundation’s intervention and the organisation’s financial gift of about R6-million to Safa to ease the tensions. At the time, the Safa hierarchy said it had learnt its lesson about sorting out such issues timeously and said a similar stand-off would not occur in the future.

Yet here we are. It’s unnecessary chaos at a time when the team’s focus should be on polishing tactics and strengthening team chemistry. Banyana Banyana’s Wafcon group features some competitive sides – Ghana, Mali and Tanzania. Their full focus and energy are required for this quest. DM