By S. Siapha Mulbah
A delegation of four members from Liberia is currently attending a workshop under the Confederation of African Football (CAF), for the Club Licensing Online Platform (CLOP) in Tanzania.
The Secretary General of the Liberia Football Association (LFA), Kollie A. Dorko, is leading the Liberian delegation in the Tanzanian Capitol, Dares Es Salaam as a means of building capacities from the program that a major requirement for local football associations under CAF.
Other members of his team are: LFA’s Club Licensing Manager Mohammed A. Sheriff, First Instant Board Chairperson Jeror Cole Bangalu and the Appeal Board Chairperson Ambrose Tarplah.
Liberia is a part of 17 African English-speaking countries that are participating in CAF’s third Club Licensing Online Platform regional workshop. The workshop started Monday May 22 and will run up to Thursday May 25, 2023.
The forum aims to accelerate the implementation and use of the CLOP by members and clubs, starting with this year’s interclub competitions.
The CLOP was introduced at a pilot phase in 2022 by CAF to have all the procedures of the licensing process in an online platform, just like FIFA Connect and Transfer Matching System.
This is the third workshop CAF is holding after forums were held in Tunisia and Benin in May and it will focus on orientations for the new club licensing regulations while the full usage of the CLOP shall begin full-swing in June.
The session that kicked off on Monday is being attended by representatives from the CAF Member Associations of Tanzania (host), Ethiopia, Egypt, Libya, Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia, Gambia, Sierra Leone, Sudan, South Sudan, Eritrea, Somalia, Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda and Zanzibar.
During the opening, the fifth Vice president of CAF, Kanizat Ibrahim, engaged with the participants and said, “CAF is looking always for new ways to develop and professionalize football in Africa, and you all play a key role in the implementation of such strategy at the domestic level. We count on your expertise in the Club Licensing not to only improve the level of our CAF Interclub competitions but also the national leagues.”
The president of Tanzania Football Federation, Wallace Karia, said, “CAF has launched the Club Licensing Online Platform, a system that allows CAF and the federations to manage the process of club licensing and stadium inspections fully online and electronically. This is a great step forward in the club licensing system in Africa, which allows us to achieve more quickly the professionalization of our competitions and clubs at all levels. Tanzania is honored to be hosting CAF-CLOP workshop for representatives of the English-speaking Federations and we hope that you will find the sessions very interesting.”
The training program will continue for the next 4 days, including a dedicated CLOP session with the local clubs of the Tanzania Football Federation next Thursday.
The CAF CLOP regional workshops are integrated as part of the activity to accelerate the implementation and use of the CLOP by the member associations and clubs, starting with the CAF Interclub competitions.
