The Director General of the National Sports Authority (NSA), Peter Twumasi, has defended his organisation’s decision to rent out the Accra Sports Stadium for concerts in December last year.
The NSA announced the stadium will be unavailable for sporting purposes during the period of December with clubs asked to take their Ghana Premier League home games elsewhere.
The venue was, however, made available for social events including Stonebwoy’s Bhim Concert, which reportedly earned the NSA GHS70,000.00.
The decision led to mass criticism from Ghanaians but facing the Public Account Committee on Monday, February 5, Twumasi stood by his actions, claiming there is nothing wrong with doing that.
“Before we shifted our sporting activities to other stadia, we made mention of this to all stakeholders that in December, a particular period will be used for other events which are not sporting and the revenue for it should be able to recover entirely everything,” he said.
“Other non-sporting activities occurring in our stadia are not new. This is not the first time Prof Twumasi is granting permission for the usage of the facilities for other non-sporting activities. It’s done all the time.
“Even Independence celebration, we did at the Tamale, Cape Coast, Baba Yara Stadium but the question is are you able to recover it and get back to the spiting activities? Yes, we do. We do recover.”
The Minister for Youth and Sports, Mustapha Ussif, however, denied playing a role in sanctioning the closure of the stadium.
Source: myjoyonline.com
