New GFF Constitution will change football in Guyana – Urling FIFA officials expected next month for Goal Project assessment

CHAIRMAN of the Guyana Football Federation (GFF) Normalisation Committee, Clinton Urling, in updating the media on the present constitutional reform process, pointed out that Guyana’s football will be enhanced in ways never before seen once everything is finalised. “Our constitution is going to change football in every way,” Urling told reporters recently at the 704 Sports Bar while addressing several issues in the sport.

FIFA Head of Association Primo Corvaro, along with CONCACAF’s Director of Legal Affairs Marco Leal recently visited Guyana where the duo spearheaded the GFF’s constitutional reform process.
The pair met with a selected group of legal minds and the Normalisation Committee at the Guyana Olympic Association for over two days, in an attempt to carry out an obligation by FIFA to reform all the constitutions of its member associations, in some cases making it specific to fit the circumstances in the sport.
Urling pointed out that at present, FIFA is working on a draft of the constitution and would then return to Guyana where the officials will once again meet with the various member associations, but, the GFF Normalisation Committee Chairman noted, “If the member associations don’t adopt it, then FIFA returns and it means the life of the Normalisation Committee will be extended and FIFA will try again”.
“The Normalisation Committee is a feature of FIFA and not the Member Association. Nowhere in the GFF statutes says anything about a Normalisation Committee, that’s in the statutes of Article 7 of FIFA, so when it’s activated, only FIFA can remove it. When it comes to us reporting and answering, we’re only obligated to do that to FIFA. When it comes to getting everyone involved, we speak to all the member associations. In fact a part of our mandate is to share all information just like we’ve been doing from the start,” Urling said.
According to Urling, if the Normalisation Committee fails in any way, the consequences could be that Guyana will be banned for a few years, adding, “there’s no doubt about that, this is the last stop. When a Normalisation Committee is in place, it’s the association telling FIFA they need help and they intervene and install this group and fix that country.”
“This period will be a test to see if Guyana is interested in being part of International football with the rest of the world and all the support that comes with it, or, if they want to just play domestic football. For me, it’s the latter which is more important than these controversies,” said Urling.
He further added, “People should try to look at things and say: Mr Urling, how can we help the situation, even if I hire a crook, what safeguards you have in place. At the end of the day, it’s the Normalisation Committee who runs Guyana’s football. The General Secretary, the Technical Director, those are support structures and at the end of the day, we’re the ones that FIFA has put in place to ensure that we manage Guyana’s football until such time.”

Goal Project
An update was also given on Guyana’s first FIFA Goal Project; one which has been in the making for decades, where Urling told the gathering of sports journalists that “two senior (FIFA) officials are expected in March and we’re making some slight changes to it as well, but those announcements will come pretty soon and some other projects that we hope to get off the ground pretty soon.”
“A lot of things are happening football-wise; positive things that should be reported as well. In fact, pretty soon we’ll be launching our elite football tournament and you’ll see an entire different structure of how the federation competitions will be and that’s where we want to take football. We’re not looking into the past, just where we can develop Guyana’s football,” said Urling.

(By Rawle Toney)

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