Detailed Report Following SASCOC/CyclingSA Forum

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Detailed Report Following SASCOC/CyclingSA Forum

Press Release - Cycling South Africa

 

 

17 November 2011 – The South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) and one of their 74 national sporting federations, Cycling South Africa, met in Johannesburg on Saturday 12 November 2011 pertaining to emails sent by an individual and Boland board member Mr. Carinus Lemmer to many individuals including media, SASCOC, and the board of CyclingSA.

 

Mr. Mubarak Mahomed, the Chair of the Transformation, Ethics and Dispute Commission of SASCOC chaired the meeting, which spanned over 3-hours. SASCOCs request for the meeting was to validate whether Mr. Lemmer was bringing the organisation (CyclingSA) into disrepute with unfounded and non-factual allegations.

 

CyclingSA President Greg Till assured SASCOC of the sound governance of the sport and welcomed any audit, further stating that the finances were published monthly and available for public scrutiny.

 

CyclingSA’s board was in full attendance.

 

Mr. Mahomed excused the media before proceedings began. Media would be addressed via a press conference after the meeting. One journalist availed himself for the press briefing after the meeting, and all the questions asked were responded to.

 

The ongoing email and social media communication caused by these allegations continue to cause damage to CyclingSA’s reputation, despite CyclingSA setting the record straight and consistently denying the authenticity and accuracy of the allegations. Every aspect of each of the 17 items within the letter was discussed in great detail, and explanations were rendered.

 

SASCOC took the opportunity to discuss CyclingSA’s constitution and a constructive outcome from this discussion requires CyclingSA to align their constitution to an approved SASCOC format as being implemented across all the other national sporting federations across South Africa. This will provide a platform for a uniform approach to managing all sporting codes in the country.

 

Mr. Mahomed highlighted the need for CyclingSA’s structure within the proposed new constitution to accommodate only correctly sanctioned affiliates. No private associations and/or clubs may affiliate themselves directly to CyclingSA. In such organisations will need to align themselves with provincial affiliates. SASCOC emphasised that it is imperative that the Board of CyclingSA continue its efforts in transforming the composition of the Board in order that it may be more representative of South African demographics.

 

CyclingSA have committed to SASCOC to have the first draft of the constitution in place before the end of December 2011. Raymond Hack (SASCOC’s legal representative) will co-ordinate the adoption of the new constitution with CyclingSA.

 

The planned Annual Congress scheduled for Saturday 19 November will be postponed to February 2012 giving CyclingSA the opportunity to present its audited financial statements and to operate under the new constitution. CyclingSA’s meeting on 19 November will therefore become the President’s Council Meeting with various commission workshops. The vacant Board and commission member posts will be filled at these meetings. According to Mr. Mahomed, the “meeting took a long time yet finished quickly”, and as a self-confessed non-cyclist, provided everybody present with ample opportunity to voice any further concerns. It was indeed unfortunate that Mr. C. Lemmer was not present.

 

With regard to CyclingSA’s finances, it was found that the unsubstantiated allegations were unacceptable to SASCOC and CyclingSA. Boland cycling was instructed to take the necessary action in order to deal with the members who are out of line and continuously bring CyclingSA into disrepute.

 

Before closing the meeting, Mr. Mahomed explained the transformation charter and how it is to be implemented, as well as summarising the discussion:

• Affiliates: There are 14 affiliates at the moment due to historical reasons. These will be changed to nine affiliates, to represent the nine provinces.

• No individual should be permitted to meddle in areas outside of their responsibility and provinces.

• CyclingSA to take the lead in dealing decisively with destructive individuals.

• Transformation is imperative and requires continued special focus.

• Development to occur in all 9 provinces – CyclingSA has to have a presence in Limpopo (currently not represented).

• SASCOC dealings are directly with CyclingSA. CyclingSA dealings are directly with affiliates. Where problems occur within those affiliates that cannot be resolved by CyclingSA, CyclingSA may approach SASCOC.

• There are no visible problems with the running of CyclingSA.

• At the last statutory congress, CyclingSA presented audited financials.

• Every issue has been addressed, and SASCOC is happy with the outcome.

 

CyclingSA found the meeting incredibly positive and the meeting forged a stronger relationship with SASCOC. CyclingSA also came away with the assurance of SASCOC’s support in all matters.