Sofapaka cornered over Asike contract

Kenyan Premier League (KPL) side Sofapaka has few or no options following an order by the company’s complaints committee that they release defender Eugine Asike in seven days for breach of contract.

Club president Elly Kalekwa said yesterday they will appeal the ruling at the Independent Disciplinary and Appeals Committee (IDAC) of the national association.

However, this may not be an option for the club who among 13 others have refused to take part in the FKF Premier League and as a result may have lost their membership at FKF.

Last Thursday, FKF withdrew membership of all the 14 KPL clubs after they failed to confirm participation in their league.

Kalekwa has, however, insisted that he will still file his appeal at FKF and will move to FIFA if he does not get justice.

“I will follow what the law says. We will pay the required fees and hope the case can be heard but if that does not happen then we will go directly to FIFA,” he said.

But even there the club may not have hope at FIFA if they are not members of FKF. Kalekwa took a swipe at the KPL complaints committee for not ‘understanding the law’ in so far as the Asike issue is concerned.

“Asike still has one year remaining on his contract and if he wants to go, we must be compensated. Nowhere did we breach the contract by failing to pay him for three months as alleged,” he said.

Kalekwa also argued that the KPL standard contract does not give a player the power of termination for whatever reason and Asike was therefore wrong to do that.

Asike wrote to Sofapaka on January 5 this year seeking to be released from his contract after the club allegedly failed to pay him his salary for March, November and December.

“The KPL contract has no such clause but the club’s contract provides that any player who wants to leave must pay us a three month’s salary before we release him. The committee must understand that as a club the only business we do is to buy and sell players and have no right to order us to release any of them on a free transfer. This will simply kill us,” he said.

Last Friday, Sofapaka were ordered to release Asike in the next seven days after he filed a case with the Kenyan Premier League (KPL) complaints committee.

The ruling was made after Sofapaka were found guilty of breach of contract for failing to pay the player his salary for three months.

“This committee found that the respondent indeed breached the employment contract that it had entered into with the claimant by failing to pay the agreed monthly salary for the months of March, November and December 2014 when the same fell due for payment as well as the signing on fee as agreed at the commencement of the contract,” said part of the ruling.

It added: “The grounds upon which the claimant terminated the contract on 5th January 2015 justified the termination and as such the Claimant was entitled to terminate the contract dated 15th January 2014 under Article 14 of the FIFA Regulations on the Transfer and Status of Players as read with the KPL Policy and Regulations on the Status and Transfer of Players.”