Satellites' Reception: GFA Lambasts Protocol Arrangements

The Spokesperson for the Ghana Football Association, Ransford Abbey, believes the near chaotic scenes that characterized the welcoming reception held in honour of the national Under-20 football team, the Black Satellites, at the Kotoka International Airport, last Saturday, could have been avoided if a little bit of professionalism had been applied by officialdom. Bedlam typified the welcoming ceremony for world champions Black Satellites at the Kotoka International Airport on Saturday, October 17. The first sign of chaos came when the pilot of the Egypt Air flight that brought the players home excitedly thrust the trophy of the Satellites outside his window as Ghanaian officials sorted themselves out inside and outside the plane. As if that was not enough, blatant official marginalization of the players soon set in as they lined up for a photo session on the tarmac. The officials took up positions before the cameras, pushing most of the players into the back and depriving them of the spotlight they so richly deserved. Giving details as to what led to the unfortunate scenes, the GFA Spokesperson clarified in an interview with Kwami Sefa Kayi on PEACEFM�s �Kokrokoo�, that since the playing body was on board an Egypt Air commercial flight, the management team decided to keep both the FIFA U-20 trophy and Dominic Adiyiah�s Golden Ball Award with the pilot, since the cock-pit was the safest place available. This he said, might explain how come the Egyptian pilot was the first to showcase the trophy to Ghanaians at the Kotoka International Airport. ��whiles they were in the plane, they didn�t even notice the pilot had opened his window and had shown the trophy, because obviously if you are on the flight, you will not know what is happening in the cock-pit and then outside. I think the pilot�it was perhaps out of over-excitement�he did something he shouldn�t have done,� he said. Mr. Abbey condemned the array of jostling officials who shamelessly took up most of the front-row seats during the photo session, adding that despite meticulous preparations towards the event; most of the officials threw caution to the wind. �in the case of�there was a committee set-up from the Presidency headed by Kojo Bonsu (CEO of AGOO Magazine), which includes all of us�we met on Saturday to plan the welcome. A lot of things were put in place�at the airport, I guess that if everybody had followed the rules we would not have had the kind of problems that we had, everybody wanted to be part of the red carpet treatment�we had a tough him telling people to stay back including politicians and football enthusiasts� he said. According to him, �originally it was supposed to be the Minister (Hon. Rashid Pelpuo), and four other persons from the FA (Football Association),� but then they �had other people rushing to be part of it,� leading to the chaotic scenes witnessed at the airport. The GFA Spokesperson who called for the right application of crowd and event management skills in the future, lashed at some staff at the airport who even abandoned their work, all in a bid to be part of the welcoming party. �we have to look at better ways of doing some of these protocol things, because sometimes when you sit behind a TV, it�s not a pleasant sight to behold�one other thing we didn�t take into consideration was the workers at the Airport. The focus was on the fans barricaded inside (the tarmac). But once the plane touched down, almost everybody stopped working at the airport and they all turned into a crowd that had to be managed,� he lamented.