By Neto Baptiste
President of the Liberta Sports Club, Kenneth Benjamin, has refuted claims of a rift between the body and parliamentary representative for the St. Paul’s constituency, EP Chet Greene.
Speaking on the Good Morning Jojo Sports Show, Benjamin admitted that he personally has some issues with the MP’s “behavior” but said this has nothing to do with the sports club.
“The MP is still assisting with the football and the last thing that we did together although I think he wasn’t here, but he had asked someone to coordinate along with the sports club, a little ceremony for
Hayden Walsh Jr when he got selected so I don’t know that the MP was honest. I have some issues with the MP’s behavior and that has nothing to do with the Liberta Sports Club and so he was very disingenuous in his interview,” he said.
In a recent interview, Greene said he would write to Benjamin requesting a meeting with the body’s executive in an effort to rectify some of the issues between them.
Benjamin, on Monday, confirmed receipt of the letter.
“I think that the MP has passed his place, he has stepped out of bounds. He is asking for a meeting and he wants to discuss the accounts for the car raffle, football development and I don’t know what that is all about, funding for sports in the community, sports calendar and training, maintenance, infrastructure. I think he is trying to make up an issue but there is no issue.
The MP never used to write, he could have picked up the phone and said hey, I want to sit down and have a chat with you guys and that was the relationship so I don’t know what he is on about,” the president said.
The former West Indies cricketer went on to add that although the clubs will meet with the MP, there is no guarantee that all of his requests will be granted.
“The MP will not get from us, anything about the car raffle because the MP didn’t deliver some cars to Liberta. He paid for some cars, we cleared them out of the port, we paid for the raffle tickets, we paid the insurance to get them out and so it was a partnership and how all of a sudden you want account for the car raffle when the monies were specifically to pay for the imported footballers last season. Nobody was owed no one at the end of last season so I don’t know where he is going with this,” he said.
“He knows exactly how much [money was made] because I sent him either an email or a WhatsApp with the breakdown and I can say this clearly, we made $33,000.00 from the car raffle and it cost the club $97,000.00 last year for the overseas players and the local players that were paid so where do you think the rest of the money came from,” Benjamin added.
Accusations of a rift between the sports club and the MP surfaced at the start of this year’s Premier Division competition with reports that Greene had refused to fund the importation of players without an official letter from the club requesting assistance.
Benjamin said however, that the club had long made it clear that they would not pay any player to represent the club and that ay arrangement for payments must be directly with the MP or any other entity willing for finance the venture.