Soccer bosses in hot water over ‘disgusting’ sexism

GENDER equality — or rather the lack thereof — has landed the South African Football Association in as big a pickle as the rugby bosses faced over the dearth of transformation of the Springboks.

MPs on the parliamentary sports portfolio committee have labelled Safa’s failure to adequately tackle gaps in women’s soccer as “disgusting” and “embarrassing”.

This comes after the Commission for Gender Equality presented a report to the committee this week. The report was prepared after a complaint was laid in 2009 by a community organisation, the South African Women’s Football Union, which is not legitimately recognised by Safa.

Public hearings were conducted in 2012. The commission said this week that it had been trying since then to engage Safa, without luck, on some of its findings, particularly about the recognition of the union.

Keketso Maema, the commission’s CEO, said that after writing numerous letters, it appeared as if it would now have to subpoena Safa. “It looks like the only language they understand is if you threaten them.”

The report states Safa did not have an employment equity policy. Maema also expressed concern about its “insufficient” sexual harassment policy, questioning why Safa had investigated only one complaint of sexual harassment in five years.

This week, Vernon Seymour, former vice-president of Safa Cape Town, approached the High Court in DEVELOPMENT: Safa’s technical assistant director for women’s football, Fran Hilton-Smith Cape Town to overturn his lifetime ban after Safa found him guilty of sexually harassing an intern.

It is not clear why the 2010 allegations of sexual harassment made against then Banyana Banyana coach Augustine Makalakalane were not included in Safa’s five-year figures.

Safa investigated claims by players that Makalakalane threatened to drop them if they did not perform sexual favours. His contract was not renewed as he had failed to qualify the team for the 2011 Women’s World Cup. Other concerns included that:

Only two of Safa’s 40-member board are women. Safa’s technical assistant director for women’s football, Fran Hilton-Smith, said this had now increased to three.

That just R36-million of Safa’s budget, which ranged from R297-million to R320-million, was allocated to women.

A reply to a ministerial question last year revealed that Bafana Bafana players were paid R30 000 for a draw and R60 000 for a win. Banyana Banyana players earned between R2 000 and R5 000 per game, as they are still classed as amateurs.

Safa told the commission that oldfashioned attitudes meant that women’s soccer did not attract the crowds or the cash associated with men’s soccer.

Said Maema: “If we look at the language of the accounting officers and CEO, they kept saying that sponsors aren’t interested, but they are not trying to cultivate a culture.”

ANC MP Samuel Mmusi said it was “disgusting” that there were only three women on the Safa board.

He said that in local football “girls gifted in soccer can’t find any local club to join. So they join the men’s or boys’ clubs, where they are faced with a barrage of criticism if they are strong, and told they are men or lesbians.”

The DA’s Solly Malatsi said the report highlighted “institutional sexism and patriarchy” and showed Safa to be “unresponsive and reticent to dismantling the patriarchal attitudes in these institutions”.

EFF MP Pebane Moteka said the report was an “embarrassment” and urged the commission to deal with Safa “as aggressively as you can and as far as the law allows you”.

Safa did not respond to all the questions sent to it, but Hilton-Smith MAKING ENDS MEET: Banyana Banyana player Portia Modise, who retired this year, said she had to live with her mother because of how poorly she had been paid. Ironically, she became the first African player to score 100 goals — across male and female soccer said the association had 35 CAF A licensed women coaches — “the most in any country in Africa”. There were female coaches in all the national teams, she said.

Three courses were planned for the rest of the year, in coaching and administration, “to develop women”.