Female abuse is rife in game, claims Afghanistan coach
American says players are ‘fearing for their lives’ Fifa investigating Jordan training camp allegations
Kelly Lindsey, the head coach of the Afghanistan women’s national team, has claimed that abuse of female footballers is widespread throughout the sport.
Fifa has launched an investigation into allegations that sexual abuse took place at a week-long training camp for the Afghan team in Jordan last year, but Lindsey fears abuse is taking place across the women’s game.
“I just think the world should ensure this doesn’t get brushed under the carpet,” she told The Daily Telegraph. “It’s so much bigger than Afghanistan. Until we find the leadership that can actually hold these governing bodies in check, I feel like this will go on. It’s happening in other federations. There are women who want to speak out, but the one thing the Afghanistan team had was enough of us on the outside to have a voice. I hope that this also inspires them to find a way to speak up.”
Khalida Popal, the former head of women’s football in Afghanistan, submitted written reports to the country’s football federation (AFF) about the training-camp allegations but was informed via phone no action would be taken. She reported the abuse to the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) but it never responded.
The specific accusations focus on Keramuddin Keram, the president of the AFF, as well as other male officials and coaches from the federation. Since taking over in 2016, Lindsey – a 39-year-old American – has not set foot in Afghanistan because of safety concerns. She claims before her appointment “the women were concerned about this deep-seated culture of abuse that has been going on for years” and had sought all-female staff to “give the women a very safe place to train and play”. “I knew there was the idea of mental abuse, where the male staff were consistently telling the players they’re not good enough, they’re women, they shouldn’t be playing,” Lindsey said.
“Jordan was the first time I was around the actual physical, sexual abuse and had the players come directly to us and complain. There were consistent phone calls to the room from the male AFF staff, trying to talk to certain players, coercing them to come to their room.
“Players wouldn’t be in their rooms throughout the evening, and [would be] coming back first thing in the morning, night after night.
“We called the president of the AFF and reported it the first morning it happened. He told us he would address it and that people would be punished.”
Lindsey claims there was no investigation and no one was spoken to. The men accused of abuse have since been promoted to other roles within the federation.
“There was a shift of roles and lip service to the women,” Lindsey said, “because we very distinctly expressed that if something wasn’t done, the players wanted to come forward and speak to the media.”
That, Lindsey says, was when the AFF proposed a contract with “only one purpose behind it: to silence women”. The contract, seen by this newspaper, states “the player at all times is obligated to maintain the secrets and news of the national team” and prohibits “use of immoral words and the assignment of misleading titles and verbs and violent acts to officials [and] coaches”.
Lindsey and Popal sought to report the abuse to Fifa, but Keram, as president, had to first sign off all communication. “He’s our only point of contact,” Lindsey said. “Without the president’s signature, nobody can do anything.”
Keram is known as “the warlord” in Afghanistan from his previous role as chief of staff in the Afghanistan Ministry of Defence. Lindsey claims many of the abuse victims “have had to escape the country and live in asylum centres because they’re scared for their lives”.
“They will tell you the repercussion is death,” she added. “They will always live in fear. That’s no way to live. They’ve had to escape with no government help, no United Nations help. They don’t speak the language, they can’t start their education, they’ll never live the life they always dreamt of. We’ve had to work hard to find some of those people, they’re so far underground.
“Once you’re labelled a non-virgin, you become fodder for other men. He [Keram] has labelled women as lesbians. With that label, their families could disown them and people could try to kill them.”
In a statement issued to the Telegraph, the AFF said it “vigorously rejects the false accusations recently made with regard to the women national team”, adding that “should the AFF receive specific factual information and/or evidence, it will … investigate.”