What Kind of Failed Promise Is Charles Taylor “Bitching” About Here?

Every four years, either during the course of the Federation of International Football Associations (FIFA) World Cup Tournament or shortly thereafter, one is almost certain to come across a nuisance news headline in which either a has-been desperate opportunistic Black Stars player or a Ghanaian politician will be reported to be bitterly complaining about one sort of personal disappointment or another. Almost nobody of some appreciable modicum of substance or significance, either presently or in the recent past, appears to be concerned about the fact that more than two decades after the Ghana Black Stars made their debut entrance at the foremost global soccer fiesta, the country has yet to realize any significant and worthwhile improvement in the amateurish and the mediocre quality of the general performance of our nation’s senior soccer team.

More so, when the game of soccer seems to be the only major sporting event in the country, as well as the world, in which our beloved nation has demonstrated the heady and the healthy potentiality that, indeed, it is a true promising force to reckon with in the offing. And sure as hell and highwater, as the jaded saying goes, this year also, Ghana has not been spared another godforsaken plaint about a former Black Stars player’s having been allegedly left in the lurch after a golden promise of an opportunity to attend the 2026 World Cup Tournament, co-hosted by the United States of America, Canada and Mexico, gratis, that is, fully paid and without a dime or a pesewa coming out of the pocket of the promised soccer retiree.

Presently, the has-been Black Stars player on the Auction Block in Our Village Square is somebody by the Afropeanized name of Mr. Charles Taylor - reminds me of the other guy in the killing fields of the Kangaroo Democratic Republic of Liberia - described by the media as a former or a retired midfielder of The Black Stars, of course (See “Ex-Black Stars Player Charles Taylor Accuses GFA of Abandoning Him in US after Failed World Cup Promise” Modernghana.com 7/7/26). The plaintiff, we are informed, has alleged having been personally and specifically been invited by the President of the Ghana Football Association (GFA) to the 2026 FIFA World Cup Fiesta, right here in God;s own United States of America - yes, the same presently MAGA-”Rapepublican”-ruled United States of America - Mexico and Canada or, presumably, wherever The Stars - as Ghana’s senior national soccer team is also popularly known and affectionately called, had been scheduled to play, with all the necessary expenses fully underwritten by both Mr. Kurt Okraku, the GFA President, and the very institutional establishment of the Ghana Football Association.

Which, under normal circumstances, would automatically and obviously also entail the provision of a fully paid roundtrip ticket to and from the United States of America or either countries that hosted the 2026 FIFA Fiesta. Now, we are not provided with the quiddities of how such promise was supposed to be unfurled which, of course, would also have implicitly included the ready provision of a roundtrip ticket to be enfolded into the plaintiff’s passport and, one also presumes, his validly stamped and/or duly embossed American, Mexican and Canadian Visas.

Now, the problem or question that the present writer is most especially interested in and/or intrigued by is the reason why Mr. Taylor does not appear to have also been provided, upfront, with a roundtrip to and from the United States of America, or wherever, hereabouts, in the Americas, where he had been scheduled to depart to Ghana from, following the widely anticipated early elimination of Ghana and The Black Stars from either the FIFA Round of 32 or, fortunately, the Round of 16, whichever happened to be the case. I forget which. No, AI just alerted me to the fact of The Black Stars’ having been eliminated by Colombia in the Round of 32. How could I have forgotten this most annoying exit of the least prepared national team in the tournament? After all, isn’t this the same country where even the most talented players have to bribe their way into being selected to play for their beloved motherland? Yes, Dear Reader, you heard me right, loud and clear!

Anyway, as of this writing, Mr. Taylor was also reported to have alleged that he had to rely on the faultful generosity of “some individuals,” presumably, some friends and acquaintances and, perhaps, even a couple of relatives, to purchase a return ticket back home to Ghana. Which also takes us to the next most important and almost knee-jerk question that we all need to be asking here already, which is as follows: why had the plaintiff not promptly demanded to be issued or provided with a roundtrip ticket well before embarking on his flights to the United States, Canada and Mexico, all three countries of which The Black Stars appears to have been scheduled to play at various times by FIFA?

I mean, should not, not making such demand upfront, and promptly so, not seem to be absolutely chuckleheaded to Yours Truly, Dear Reader? More so, when Mr. Taylor is expected to have been well aware of the long-established image and reputation of the leadership and the administrators of the Ghana Football Association’s not being trustworthy, almost to each and every leader and administrator, with such promises, at least as has been forensically established since the birth and the upbringing of any bona fide Ghanaian citizen of approximately the Same Senior Citizen’s Age as Yours Truly? Moreso, when the GFA’s long track record of abject failure to follow through with even its most routine promises to even actively engaged big name and bigtime and internationally renowned and well-paid Black Stars and former Black Stars is common knowledge and readily accessible, documentarily, to any intelligent and critically thinking Ghanaian who so desired?

But I really wanted to highlight the fact that it is far and long well-past-time for the modus operandi of the Ghana Football Association to experience a paradigmatic shift; which, of course, means that such peripheral and paraprofessional roles and functions as availing superannuated or long-retired Black Stars players the quite remarkable and, to be certain, even decent privileges and/or opportunities to attend FIFA and/or any other historically significant sporting events, ought to be properly ceded to Professional Unions of Soccer Players and Professional Soccer Industry Employees if, indeed, any such institutional establishments already exist in the country.

If not, then it is about time that such institutional structures or establishments got created in the country, especially institutional establishments that deal with the socioeconomic security and the post-retirement wellbeing and comfort of such high-risk but relatively well-salaried and short-career jobs as the Almighty Sports Industry. This is precisely where the President of the Ghana Football Association, namely, Mr. Kurt Okraku, needs to demonstrate well beyond any shadow of a doubt that, indeed, his much-touted professional expertise in Sports Management and, in particular, Soccer or Football Administration is worth every millimeter of the metaphorical sheepskin on which it is written or tattooed.

The Ghana Football Association needs to be sedulously focused on the big and the exponentially profitable business of creating World-Class Soccer Players, and not play the clearly oversized role of an industry factotum or Jack-of-all-Trades. And on the latter count must also be created an independent corporate establishment for the insurance of our soccer players and, to be certain, the socioeconomic security of all Ghanaian Athletes and generously talented sportsmen and sportswomen. And then we can all realistically dream big and stop absurdly and noetically tickling ourselves with our blind immersion into the duncecap subculture of fatuous and Faux-Religious and Gumption-Bereft Soccer Predictions gussied up as Divine Prophecies, which properly belong to the benighted Age of the Dinosaur.

By Kwame Okoampa-Ahoofe, Jr., PhD
Professor Emeritus, Department of English
SUNY-Nassau Community College
Garden City, New York
August 3, 2026
E-mail: [email protected]