Desmond Iwuchukwu
Go Round FC have dragged Rivers United to the FIFA Player Statute Committee for failure to meet up with contractual obligations.
The General Manager of Go Round FC, Dr. Soni Uboh, said the Port Harcourt-based side has not kept to the terms of the contract both parties signed regarding the transfer of Nelson Esor.
“We had a clause in the contract with them in the Esor deal that in event of a further transfer, we (Go Round FC) will get thirty-five percent, but since Esor moved to Simba, Rivers United have neither paid us the money nor even responded to any of our correspondence to them,” Uboh said.
According to the General Manager of Go Round FC, his club, through its secretary first wrote to Rivers United to confirm Esor had moved but got no response.
“The second letter to them was to confirm how much the deal was worth and ask when we will get our payment and they ignored it,” Soni Uboh continued.
“By the time we wrote a third letter to them, they, rather than reply to it, called a meeting which had their General Manager Okey Kpalikwu, Sports Commissioner, Chris Green, and Secretary, Ahmed Abdulrahman in attendance where they told our secretary that we were not eligible to get the money anymore and they will not pay.
“The meeting was called by Christopher Green under the pretense of resolving the issue, but rather he made a case why Rivers United would not pay our thirty-five percent to us.
“The only thing we can do at this time is to take the case to the FIFA Player statute committee, and that is where we are now.
“I spoke to the General Manager of Rivers United and he told me that only the sports commissioner, Chris Green can approve payment of the money, and this appears to me like interference.
“The sports commissioner has also hijacked the matter because he has suggested that if we don’t mind he can just give something little to help us. I consider this ridiculous and an attempt to short-changed us,” Soni Uboh said.
“Even the player, Nelson Esor had reached out to me, to inform me that payment had been made and he asked if we had gotten our percentage from Rivers United. This further buttresses the agreement between us, the player, and Rivers United,” Uboh said.
Rivers United claim that because Nelson Esor renewed his contract with them after the initial three years, then Go Round FC is not eligible to get their 35% sell-on clause from the deal that took him to Simba FC in Tanzania.
As a club, Go Round FC awaits FIFA’s Player Status Committee decision on Rivers United’s attempt to rip us off our entitlement on our former captain whom we nurtured from our amateur days while he was a student of Federal College of Education (Technical) Omoku.
