Retired Players Fund launch July

The Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Retired National Footballers Endowment Fund, Prof. Kwame Karikari says plans are far advanced to launch the fund in July to bring relief to all retired footballers.

He said when launched, the fund could be assessed by both men and women footballers who are registered with the Retired National Footballers Association of Ghana (RENFAG) and have attained the ages of 40 and 45 for women and men respectively.  

The President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA), Mr Kwesi Nyantakyi, announced the establishment of the fund last year during a media launch at the Alisa Hotel. The fund was expected to be launched last March but did not materialise.

However, Prof. Karikari in an exclusive interview with the Daily Graphic last Monday, said many administrative and fundraising challenges contributed to the delay but promised that the situation would be fixed by July to enable the commencement of the project.

The former head of the School of Communication Studies of the University of Ghana mentioned difficulty in recovering pledges from corporate bodies and individuals, as well as the difficulty in collecting memorabilia such as boots, jerseys and others which were used by some old players to be auctioned at the event as major setbacks.

“We also need President John Dramani Mahami’s full participation in the programme, since all the national teams belong to the government of Ghana, but nobody can dictate the timetable for the President so we have proposed July, depending on the day that will be convenient for him in that month,” he added.