How much incentive is enough?

The announcement on Wednesday by the President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) of an increment in the bonus of the Black Stars to $15,000 to serve as an extra incentive for the team to defeat Egypt in their World Cup playoff next week sent mixed signals throughout the country.

As was to be expected, the timing of the announcement by Kwesi Nyantakyi to coincide with the morale-boosting visit to the team by President John Dramani Mahama not only drummed home the importance of the two-leg playoff, particularly next Tuesday’s first leg clash in Kumasi, but also split Ghanaians down the middle over whether or not too much money was being spent on the senior national team.

For many years football has been perceived by the less-privileged sporting disciplines as the “spoilt child” in the family and last Wednesday’s gesture only went to accentuate that notion about the disproportionate concentration of resources on football, to the disadvantage of other sporting disciplines.

Only recently, the President of the Ghana Olympic Committee (GOC), Prof. Francis Dodoo, bared his heart out concerning the neglect of other sports, most of which have been left to struggle to survive due to the failure of the Ministry of Youth and Sports to ensure that budgetary allocations are made available to them to run their activities this year.

The jury is still out there over whether or not the nation spends too much money on the national teams, expecially the Black Stars, some of whose players rank among the highest earning footballers in the world. Nonetheless, it remains a fact that as the best organised sports, with a mass appeal, football naturally courts more support from governments and private entities in the form of sponsorship.

In the case of the Black Stars, the team enjoys so much corporate support from domestic and international corporate bodies such as the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC), PUMA, Guinness Ghana Breweries, Latex Foam, Centauro and Rice Master’s in annual sponsorship payments.

These secure, regular stream sources of income make the Black Stars’ pot big enough for the FA and sponsors to dish out mouth-watering bonuses to motivate the players ahead of important matches, such as next Tuesday’s playoff against the seven-time African champions.

While the national debate on state funding of sporting associations rages on, in the light of the austere situations other associations have been forced to endure this year, it is also important that the nation gives the Black Stars its fullest backing not only through prayers and support at the stadium but also good incentives to ensure Ghana makes it to the third successive FIFA World Cup in Brazil next summer because of the far reaching benefits a World Cup appearance has in store for the country.

Qualification for the two previous World Cup tournaments in 2006 and 2010 brought so much economic and intangible benefits to Ghana and the Brazil 2014 World Cup will bring enormous benefits, including unprecedented national unity, which is so much desired as politics has split the nation down the middle.

Qualification to Brazil and subsequently a good showing will not only engender a sense of good feeling among Ghanaians but also earn the Black Stars and for that matter Ghana about $14 million, some of which will go back to government’s kitty.

It stands to reason that while the sentiments expressed about government’s spending are legitimate, the significance of qualifying for Brazil 2014 is such that nothing should stop the nation from throwing its full weight behind the team to qualify at the expense of Egypt.

Graphic Sports/Ghana