FFA Congress War 2017 – The need for greater transparency.

The 2017 FFA Congress War has been reported widely, but transparency from all parties has been lacking. A mob view was created without an insight or reason for change. We just got told that A-League clubs needed a fair vote on congress.

Why are A-League club’s issues more important than every other stakeholder within our game? How will they use any increased power they get from congress reform? What are the FFA doing so badly which requires this to be so important? Why wasn’t it as big an issue five years ago?

Many of these questions have yet to be answered.

I have been public in calling for Steven Lowy to resign, my view formulated by the position that if you have created a financial crisis within the game via ignorance you no longer have a mandate to run soccer in this country. It was reason to impeach Labbozzetta, it should be the case for Lowy.

However, I covered the story that was unveiled to me, whether it advantaged my set perspective or not. I received information from all the parties in the war because of this.

I told sources from the FFA that I believed Steven Lowy should resign. During an hour long conversation I ranted about the failures of his tenure.

I still received information from this source and investigated the issues regardless of consequences to the set position I had.

Too often the coverage of this war has been agenda driven, perspectives of the soccer media became engrained on the information that was given to them. Their desires for change, skewed the story.

Daily coverage of the crisis became more about who was being fed information from set sources to deliver on a particular agenda. It became a feed me situation, rather than an investigate and scrutinise scenario.

In the 1995 Election (the one I have researched the most) David Hill was scrutinised publically on SBS’s The World Game Program with other candidates. Despite there being backroom deals that secured victory for Hill, there was a greater degree of public scrutiny of how each candidate’s position would change the trajectory of the game in this country.

In 2017, we have yet to hear how the game in this country becomes better with more A-League representation on the Congress. All we have heard is the need for Congress reform.

Now that the A-League club’s and to a lesser extent the State Federations of NSW and Victoria are on the back foot, it may be an idea to prosecute a caimpaign that articulates a reason for the Football community of Australia to back the changes in congress.

Tell us why 9-5-1-1 is so critical for the game’s future.

By Chris Egan