It is unfortunate that just as the unnecessary debate as to why national skipper Stephen Appiah opted out of the Black Stars impending international matches seems to have abated, we should have on our hands serious financial practices against the Minister of Sports Alhaji Muntaka Mubarak.

The acrimonious debate on Appiah’s decision so dominated the media landscape that, it actually threatened to eclipse preparations being made by the Black Stars for their upcoming World Cup qualifying match against Mali this weekend.

Indeed the trial match against Uganda last week nearly played second fiddle to the Appiah episode and we thank God that the match turned out to be a healthy exercise with a mammoth patronage at the new stadium in Tamale.

Even though a couple of the established stars notably Michael Essien and Sulley Muntari could not feature in the match against Uganda, the nation was assured that Ghana still has a strong squad capable of reaching the World Cup finals in South Africa.

Serbian coach Milovan Javecak can boast of a lot of talented players and he is hopeful of a brilliant outing against Mali on Sunday.

The only prayer is that the media will not lose focus on the match by diverting attention to the alleged financial scandal involving Sports Minister Mubarak who is on record as trying to meddle with the bonus of the players on the eve of their recent World Cup qualifier against Benin in Accra. His demeanor attracted a lot of public reaction and I would like to recall a bit of what I wrote about him in this blog on April 18 2009. I will make no further comments until the issues involved are finally settled.

This is what I wrote on April 8th 2009 (Click on link below)