JFF ‘disrespect’ irks St Thomas club

MARLON RUSSELL, coach and sporting director of Golden Grove United, is disgruntled over what he deemed disrespect and a move engineered to embarrass the St Thomas Football Association following the Jamaica Football Federation’s (JFF) decision to suspend the parish association on Thursday.

In a press release, the JFF confirmed the St Thomas FA and the Trelawny FA member privileges had been suspended after their failure to hold parish elections by the mandated August 31 deadline.

“The Board of the Jamaica Football Federation has taken a decision to suspend the membership privileges of the parishes of Trelawny and St Thomas for failing to comply with a directive of Congress on June 1, 2024, for all parish elections to have taken place by August 31, 2024,” the statement read.

“This suspension of membership privileges will be in force until the parish has their election, and the process is satisfactory to the JFF Board, and if at the next meeting of the board the elections are still outstanding, then the board will consider further action if necessary.”

Russell said the JFF’s disciplinary action was unnecessary and disrespectful to the St Thomas FA and its member clubs as they were open regarding their struggles to hold their annual general meeting in time for the deadline.

St Thomas FA president Wayne Thompson, while speaking with The Gleaner on Thursday, had confirmed the elections were delayed due to issues the association had with auditing their accounts.

Russell said because the JFF had acknowledged their issues as a legitimate concern, he was surprised to learn through media reports that the St Thomas FA had been suspended.

“I can tell you over here at the club, we’re very uncomfortable based on how the JFF really dealt with this situation because I see where the JFF, in my opinion, tried to put down our parish and that’s really hurtful for me,” he said.

“They would have received a letter from the St Thomas FA saying that our AGM would be delayed because we don’t have an auditing company to audit our financial situation, so we wouldn’t be able to go on until the audit was complete. The JFF knows that and they had sent back a letter to acknowledge such.”

Russell continued, “So if I send you information and you send back a letter saying you’ve acknowledged it, isn’t that confirming you have received our information? So after saying you’ve acknowledged our struggles, why would you, out of the blue, drop a letter into the media saying we’re suspended?”

In their press release, the JFF stated the decision to suspend the parish associations was to keep in line with its constitution.

“This action was taken under the provisions of article 16 (Member obligation) and article 17 (Suspension) of the JFF Constitution,” it stated.

“The JFF is committed to good governance and transparency and wants to ensure that the wider football membership is the beneficiary of that good governance.”

However, Russell believes the suspension has brought undue attention to the St Thomas FA and has publicly embarrassed the governance of football in the parish.

He stated the parish association has always done their best to meet the obligations set by the JFF, despite waning financial resources.

Russell believes a retraction of the suspension, an apology from the JFF and further conversation between both parties are the next steps required to resolve the situation at hand.