 Alright, welcome back to the Sports Mag Zone, we continue today with football. The crisis plagued the Jamaica Football Federation, JFF. Suffered another setback after Siddhala Mali renounced her global ambassadorship with the body. Since 2014, Siddhala Mali, through her role as global ambassador for the reggae girls, has invested approximately US$2.75 million into the Jamaica women's football program. But in a public letter addressed to the JFF dated Thursday, January 4, she expressed frustration with the arm pass between the JFF and the senior reggae girls. Siddhala says, I must express my disappointment and growing concern with the turn things have taken in recent months. After the World Cup, I was under the impression that we were committed to working together to build on that success. However, the ever-winding rift between the JFF and the team is very alarming. Numerous overtures to each of you to voice my concern and try to assist with a resolution continue to be met with non-committal generic response. The current state of affairs leads me to conclude that the Federation is neither receptive to nor interested in my current manner of support. Therefore, I am tendering my resignation as global ambassador effective immediately. In a subsequent letter, this time sent to the president of the JFF, Michael Ricketts, the Bob and Rita Marley Foundation announced it will be discontinuing its financial support to the Jamaica women's football program. The foundation says, in light of their revised focus and funding priorities, they have reached the conclusion that they can no longer continue their financial support of the JFF program. Meanwhile, JFF President Michael Ricketts says Sadella Marley cutting ties with the Federation is unfortunate. This is what he said, I am saddened by the unfortunate decision of Ms Marley to cut ties with the women's program at this time. This is even more so as we are of the views that we had made significant progress in the discussions and are just awaiting the World Cup players to come back to us and advise of their availability. We must thank Ms Marley and Bob Marley Foundation for all the support that they have given over time. We want to assure her that the gains that have been made will be concrete as we move into the future. Through the program, the JFF has managed to convince young girls that they have viable career paths in the game as it develops globally. Finally, we are happy that she will continue to lend support to local women's football. Through the Football is Freedom initiative and our egos offer any support that might be requested. So Lance, that was a mouthful but of course it was very very important that we shared all parts of these press releases to the viewers. What do you now make of everything that has happened? As you said at the top of the show Mariah, it isn't a shocking development given the caustic relationship that has existed between the reggae girls and the JFF. I think it's instructive that this is happening nine days before the presidential elections because my investigations suggest that if this current JFF president loses, there may be some kind of a patching up. I think what we are seeing here is a statement from Sidella Marley that she has given up on this JFF administration, which is sad. I've said on this show before that I don't think that everything the girls have done and Sidella did in this project would have been right because they were accused of overstepping their roles in some instances and so on. So whereas that may be a point of issue with the JFF, the fact is the JFF administration as a governing body for football in Jamaica has been a failure. They have done poorly and they have no confidence from the private sector to inject money into the system. I am stunned about one of the lines that the JFF president Michael Ricketts said in the statement when he said the JFF has managed to convince young girls that they have viable career paths in the game as it develops globally. The JFF has managed to convince young girls? That's shocking. I would think that young girls who now see football as a viable path for their careers would have felt that way based on what they have seen the reggae girls do and not what the JFF has done. But you know it is a part of the arrogance that we are seeing from some of our sporting administrators that I find mind-boggling because in this project that has been successful with the reggae girls. The JFF has not been the dominant part of this dream. The dominant part of the dream has been Siddhala Marley inculcating confidence and financial support to get the ball rolling and get the girls there. The JFF played its role but I would suggest that it has not been a dominant role. So for Ricketts to say that the JFF has managed to convince young girls that they now have a, I find that to be a slap in the face and I think it is this kind of posture that continues to have the JFF and the reggae girls being in a standoff position and again it's to me a representation of how arrogant our sporting leaders can be. A couple of months ago I saw the Jamaica Cricket Association President on television Billy Heaven when asked about support that he will have since he has decided to run again. He said that there are only about six or seven people who are opposing him. Six or seven. That's what he said on air. Now I suggest that he means that six or seven people have publicly shown their lack of support for him but I would suggest that there are thousands and thousands of cricket fans who feel that he has failed as a Jamaica Cricket Association President. But he was on air saying there are only about six or seven people who have come out complaining about his presidential performance. Ruby Alice, the Spanish football president, when the Hermosa kiss became an uproar he said that all the people who are criticizing him are idiots. That's what he said. So Lance, based on the three examples that you just cited, do you think and I mean this is a pertinent discussion that those in authority are very disconnected and in a world of their own from what is really happening and what's weird on the streets and how the players are feeling and if so that's a major problem because how can you be governing an organization when you are not in touch with what's happening on the ground? Well you would never hear Ricketts say that whenever he speaks he speaks as if he is in touch but for him to feel and suggest confidently that he has been a good president of the JFF and a successful administrator of football is a narrative that is is ludicrous as far as I am concerned. He's on record as saying that he's the best Jamaica Football Federation president ever and I don't think he'd have many people agreeing with him. Let me be clear here because running the JFF isn't easy, running any football association isn't easy especially in a situation where funding is a problem and they don't have enough money to do all the things they want to do. So the fact that the fact that he has his administration has failed in my opinion to do a good job is not to say that they haven't tried or you know they haven't made an effort but failure is failure and there are too many there are too many measuring sticks that we could use to suggest that football administration needs a far, far superior governing body than what we've been getting in recent years. Too many measuring sticks that suggest that to me. So I am disappointed about this latest development because Siddhala Marley has done a lot with this football but I think it is an illustration that she's fed up and I don't think she should be the only person fed up. I think that football fans in the country should be fed up with the administration that they have been getting in the past years. I'm not sure what's going to happen in the elections on the 14th of January because I've said before that we have a crisis of leadership here because there's no guarantee that if Ricketts loses Andes's group will be any better. So it's a sorry state as far as I'm concerned. Yeah, we wait and see. Just about seven days left before we find out the outcome of that election. We're going to take a quick break when we come back. It's the fun part of the show, interactive time.