Ghana has been struck with a shockwave following a revelation of the detailed breakdown of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) budget presented to the Sports Ministry for the 2022 World Cup held in Qatar.
What has surprised Ghanaians the most is how the GFA decided to pay $100,000 each to fifty-four (54) people when the team was made up of only twenty-six (26) players.
This goes to show that twenty-eight (28) others were budgeted for and paid $100,000 each for not making an appearance for the Black Stars.
The question on the lips of many Ghanaians is who are the ‘28 ghost players’ who were paid $100,000 each for no work done.
On November 14, 2022, Black Stars coach Otto announced a squad list of twenty-six players to represent Ghana at the World Cup.
Beyond the other-worldly experience of playing on the grandest stage of all, each player was going to earn a whopping $100,000 as an appearance fee.
This sums the total amount the Ghanaian tax payer paid as appearance fee to the Black Stars for the 2022 World Cup to $5.4 million.
Another curious item on the GFA’s budget was the cost of air tickets to enplane the Black Stars players to Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
The GFA budgeted to pay $7,000 for each player.
The question on the lips of Ghanaians is how the plane tickets cost the same for each player when they flew to the UAE from different parts of the world. For example, Andre Ayew was playing in Qatar at the time. How could his plane ticket cost the same as Daniel Afriyie Barnieh who joined from Ghana?
On December 2, 2022, Ghana lost 0-2 to Uruguay during its third match in the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar. This meant that the country could no longer proceed in the World Cup games.
Ghana had won 3-2 against South Korea on November 28, 2022, which had ranked it second on the Group H table.
It was among the five African countries that qualified for the 2022 World Cup. At the end of its first match, two goals were scored against its opponent, Portugal. Andre Ayew and Osman Bukari were Ghana’s scoring players in that match.
