Fair Play: A chance for Cebu football to move forward

(This is the draft of my Fair Play column for Sun.Star Cebu, April 2 issue)

CONGRATULATIONS to the new members of the CFA board, majority of whom, were nominated by the Cebu Amateur Football Club.

It was a contentious election and there�s no use revisiting how these guys were elected.  What is important is we have a new board and a new chance for the Cebu football community to move forward.

Ricky Dakay and Raffy Musni return to the CFA board, and will be sitting with fellow CAFC nominees Nimrod Qui�ones, Rico Navarro of SHS-Ateneo de Cebu, Michael Veloso, Fr. Heinz Kuiueke of USC, Joey Herrera, Glenn Quisido and top vote getter Rodney Orale of Erco.

And to say that the Queen City faction got the numbers in the new board over the rest would be an understatement but instead of pointing that out, let me just remind Sir Ricky, Raffy and Glenn that in the previous elections, they too had the numbers.

They too started as one unified body. Friends sitting in the CFA board.  But something happened and friends no longer even speak to each other.

And I hate to see that happen to this bunch.  That shouldn�t happen again.

Being outsiders in the previous term, Ricky, Raffy and Glenn have raised a few questions on how the CFA board did their thing, and I hope they wouldn�t face such questions by being transparent, open and logical.

Let me just throw a monkey wrench by raising the Springdale and referees issues because I think, how the new board will deal with these is something the community wants to know.

And I think the new board should shouldn�t overturn the three-year ban outright just because Springdale is with their faction. For me, that would be favoritism at its worst, something they have accused the previous board.

What they can do, of course, is follow a process. Put up an appeals committee headed by a non-CFA member and let Springdale go through the whole process.

Because that�s what they�ve been crying the past few months, that there was no due process.

As to the referees, I hope those who decided to stick with the CFA during the split won�t be purged to be replaced by referees identified with CAFC because that would be a disaster.  That would lead to the same questions thrown at the CFA in previous terms�that the referees favor the CFA board members� teams.

We need the best referees in the CFA, affiliation be damned. Give all the refs a clean slate and start from scratch and those who make the cut�regardless of where they were allied in the previous term�should be in the CFA pool.

And, as I have already told sir Ricky and Raffy, the province-wide grassroots program of the previous term is a commendable project that should be continued and since the new board has more connections with the province, I think they can get this program, a notch higher.

One of the concerns the media had about the previous board was that it seems, they didn�t know much about media relations and with Rico Navarro and Nimrod Quinones on board, that shouldn�t be a problem.

Both write for The Freeman but I don�t think they�d tilt the odds in their paper�s favor when it comes to footie news and updates.

Anyway, I have great expectations from the new board, and I think majority share the same sentiment too.  My only request is this, that whatever disagreements the new board will have�and like any organization, they will have them�I hope that they get to talk it over.

Let�s shove factionalism and infighting to the dust bin, shall we?