No meeting, no resolve

JFF, PLCA yet to settle on players' contracts

André Lowe, Senior Staff Reporter

The dispute between the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF) and the national senior players looks set to drag into the new year after a planned meeting between the JFF and the Premier League Clubs' Association (PLCA) in Ocho Rios yesterday morning failed to materialise.

PLCA chairman Edward Seaga and JFF president, Captain Horace Burrell, did, however, discuss the matter over the telephone.

Nevertheless, a more formal meeting remains necessary after yesterday's conversation left more questions than answers for the PLCA, with Seaga admitting that there seems to be some inaccuracies as it relates to what his body was told by the players and what the JFF is saying.

"A couple of things that we were told by the players were discussed. The general secretary (Horace Reid) denied that he had been bullying the players to sign the agreement," said Seaga, a former prime minister, yesterday afternoon.

"It was decided that we would have a proper meeting between the JFF and the PLCA to have full discussion on the document, which the JFF maintain was the same document that was signed by the players sometime ago; there seems to be some mix-up in the whole matter.

Both parties have been at loggerheads since the recently concluded Digicel Caribbean Cup in Martinique, where a stand-off ensued between the federation and the players, who refused to train and threatened to boycott the entire tournament unless their demands were met.

The demands included 80 per cent of any prize monies won, which ended up being US$120,000, the value of the first-place cash award, and US$1,200 per diem for each player during the tournament. The demands were eventually met by Burrell and the team went on to win the competition.

In the aftermath, the JFF presented a four-year contract to each player with certain requirements, citing that failure by any player to sign the document would result in that player not being considered for selection for future assignments.

The PLCA intervened on the players' behalf and accused the JFF of "hijacking" the rights of the players and employing "draconian" measures to bully the players into signing the document.

"They (JFF) thought that was a harshcriticism," Seaga said in reference to his association's "draconian" comment. "The areas that we contended were not based on facts, but the facts we got were from the players so it left the matter in a position where we are not going to argue whether it's draconian or not, we are just going to argue the form of the agreement itself."

Seaga pointed out that his association would be issuing a release on the matter, but up to press time this was not available.

When contacted, Burrell refused to comment on the matter.

A new date has not been set for the meeting, but Seaga is expecting that the December 30 deadline that has been set by the JFF for the players to sign the contracts will at least be abandoned.

"We haven't set any dates yet for the new meeting, this is a bad time to set dates," Seaga said. "As it relates to the deadline, I presume that it will be extended.

"They haven't said so, but I can tell you that we don't expect it to go any further until we have a meeting," Seaga warned.