Safa Cape Town Head of Referees Zama Yokwana says he will not hold a gun against any referee’s head if they decline to officiate at certain football venues on the Cape Flats.
This comes after one of his officials was shot during a drive-by shooting while doing duty at an ABC Motsepe fixture at the Downberg Road Sports Field on Friday evening.
Yokwana conceded it is indeed very alarming and difficult to control and to monitor this matter.
“I won’t blame them at all in future if they refuse or are reluctant to do duty,” Yokwana told No Bones with Jones. “I believe the region must do something about it as it is life-threatening. I think it could help to play our games during the day rather than at night in those areas,” he added.
According to Yokwana he was just as shocked as the broader public when he was informed about the unfortunate incident.
“When I heard the news, it was really hard to understand what happened. However, luckily one of the referees committee members (Mr Luvo Mkizwana from Saps) was at the field on the night. He acted swiftly and took the assistant referee to the hospital.
“Thank God the bullet entered and exited without touching any of the bones. The official was treated at the Heideveld hospital and discharged in the early hours of this morning. He is feeling better now and is in the comfort of his home.”
Meanwhile, Safa Cape Town president, Bennett Bailey, has also voiced his concern and condemned this attack on the football fraternity as cowardly.
Bailey explained: “Firstly, it was a very unfortunate situation which happened to one of our officials and we need to ensure that the environment is safe for our players and officials. Therefore it is important for a host club to have a relationship with Saps and the neighborhood watch in their areas.
“And if you look where football is played for the express purpose of combating crime, we need to double our efforts to get more young people into sport so that we can prevent them from being on their way to court. We need to redouble our efforts and get more young people into our sport. I want to emphasize it is a very very tough and unfortunate incident, but we will continue to play football.
However, we need to make sure that the environment is safe for our players and officials to live out their passion.
“You know it has been sacrosanct that you can do whatever and wherever but not on the football field and now it was brought into the field. I think those individuals were very mischievous and I hope they are brought to book,” Bailey concluded.
This is the second consecutive week whereby football was abandoned due to gang violence after the match in Heideveld between Goal50 United and Silver Spurs was called off just before halftime. The players had to dive for cover after shots rang out in the vicinity of the field.
