Techiman City Football Club’s review application against the GFA Appeals Committee’s ruling on November 27, 2015, has been rejected.
The full ruling on the review application by Techiman City FC is as follows:
Panel Members:
- Emmanuel Annan – Chairman
- Alhaji Farouck Seidu – Vice Chairman
- Owusu Ansah Awere – Member
- Claude Oppon – Member
- Divine Sunu – Member
- Kwame Takyi – Member
- Baffour Akoto – Member
- Daniel Oduro – Secretary
Techiman City Football Club filed an application to review the GFA Appeals Committee’s decision of November 27, 2015. The grounds for the review included:
- Errors of law and lack of jurisdiction
- Failure to apply GFA Regulations and Statutes
- Procedural flaws and abuse of regulations
- Establishing bad precedents
The first issue considered was the panel’s alleged lack of jurisdiction, as this would render the decision invalid. The club argued that since the matter referred by the Ethics Committee was in the form of a review application, the Appeals Committee should have been made up of seven members (as per review procedures), not the five-member panel that initially heard the case. The applicant claimed the five-member panel lacked the jurisdiction to make the decision.
However, Article 42.1 of the GFA Statutes states that the Appeals Committee is composed of ten members, with five members forming a quorum to hear any given case. Seven members are empaneled specifically for review applications. Therefore, the panel that heard the case correctly consisted of five members, as it wasn’t a review but an appeal.
Furthermore, Article 42.7 of the GFA Statutes outlines that the Appeals Committee has the power to review its decisions only in two cases: either on the Committee’s initiative (suo motu) or on an application by an aggrieved party. Since the Ethics Committee referred the matter for a second review, it did not invoke the review jurisdiction as outlined in the statutes. Therefore, the original panel of five members was appropriately constituted.
Upon reviewing the remaining grounds for the application, the committee found no exceptional circumstances to warrant overturning the Appeals Committee’s decision from November 27, 2015. As a result, the review application was dismissed.
