Team manager James Scott sent an open letter to his players stating that the club would no longer play under the ConIFA banner, having ‘lost all respect for them as an organisation, for a number of reasons.’
The decision to quit comes just over two years after the Island side joined the independent association for non-Fifa regions.
The fallout began after PoJ hosted the organisation’s 2020 AGM at the Grand Hotel last January, with both Blower and Scott having concerns over governance. Relations later soured and matters came to a head after ConIFA announced their intention to host a European tournament in Nice this June – without the Caesareans.
PoJ had been scheduled to appear at the 2020 ConIFA World Football Cup in North Macedonia, before the coronavirus pandemic forced its cancellation.
In his letter, Scott said he remains ‘determined to get [the players] involved in meaningful games/tournaments’ – a point reiterated by Blower while highlighting his concerns over ConIFA’s approach behind the scenes.
It was rumoured online that the association’s executive refused committee votes to members who did not pay their annual 500-euro fee, after a number of clubs asked for an exemption due to the financial pressures associated with Covid-19.
‘We have had a number of concerns over ConIFA which go back to when we hosted the AGM last year and also how the run-up to the World Cup was dealt with, when it was very obvious it was going to be cancelled’, Blower explained.
‘It’s an organisation that means very well but there have been issues surrounding governance. There are no audited accounts and only one person [the current ConIFA president] has access to the bank accounts, which is having a six-figure income. That’s not something that James and I are at all comfortable with. There are a number of members who are unhappy.
‘We, along with several other members, gave a notice to the ConIFA executive requesting that the membership fees for 2021 be waived. There was obviously no football in 2020 and, therefore, no outgoings for ConIFA.
‘Most of the members rely on sponsorship and income from matches, which obviously we weren’t able to get as well. So a number of us felt that [the fee] should be postponed. But that was ignored [and] we were effectively excluded for not paying.’
Blower confirmed that PoJ had expressed interest in taking part in the European Football Cup this summer but felt it was an unrealistic proposition while the world is still in the midst of the global pandemic. He also believes that PoJ were being sidelined by ConIFA after the club joined the World Unity Football Alliance, which includes the likes of Yorkshire, Darfur United [Sudan], California Football Federation and Matebeleland [Zimbabwe].
‘It became very clear that we were being punished for joining WUFA,’ Blower said. ‘This was the same of Matabeleland, who were also squeezed from the women’s World Cup despite them being of the most active members. Just as, like us, they have previously hosted an AGM, they’ve hosted tournaments and they weren’t even on the reserve list.
‘We’re disappointed to be treated this way.’
