Football Federation President ready for new term in office
bertie chimilio
It has been an extremely chaotic and controversial week for football and this past Saturday Dr. Bertie Chimilio re-emerged triumphant after yet another attempt to oust him from his seat as president of the Football Federation of Belize. Despite strong opposition from Minister of Sports John Saldivar and FFB hopeful Sergio Chuc, Chimilio was installed for a fourth term. The election was held at the FFB Headquarters in Belmopan even with the looming threat that sporting facilities owned and operated by the National Sports Council, would not be accessible. Today News Five spoke with Chimilio via telephone and he shrugged off the events of the past week as mere football politics.
Via Phone: Bertie Chimilio, President, FFB
“I think after this the people in the sports will realize that football, being one of the bigger and most popular sports in the world, they will just want to work and make sure football works.”
James Adderley
“Could you give us an indication of what your agenda will be under these new conditions?”
Via Phone: Bertie Chimilio
“Which new conditions?”
James Adderley
“Well, we do have a sports structure that obviously in opposition to you being the president.”
Via Phone: Bertie Chimilio
“Again, that’s a system of politics that we play in this country. We have the PUP and the UDP and the VIP and all the Ps so you know there are people who opposed to people and once you are in leadership position you have to understand that not everybody will be with you, not everybody will be supporting but as long as you continue to work for the people that matter; not anybody else; with the people that matter. Once you work with the people that matter; everything should work out. We continue to focus on our youth development, we continue to focus on preparing already for World cup 2014 eliminations. We definitely have to bring up the women. One area we have to strengthen is our administrative sector that showed this time that the different leagues and the different associations do need to be strengthened legally and administratively. So those are the areas we have to work with.”
Chimilio says they are also in the third phase of the gold project, which aims to bring the football stadium in Belmopan up to international standards. James Adderley will have more with Chimilio in Sports Monday.
The emergence of Dr. Chimilio as the monolith of Belizean Football is a reflection of the chaos that prevails at the club level within the footballing community at large. As the clubs go, so do the district associations. As the district associations go, so would the country. This state of affairs provides the raison d’etre for Dr Chimilio’s modus operandi. The tragedy is that Dr. Chimilio, instead of using his position as the FFB President to strengthen player organization into clubs, has accepted the Belizean football pandemonium as a given and perpetuated a system of personally appointing chairmen and vice chairmen to the district associations. These appointees happen to be the only medium through which the FFB President can be challenged since the FFB statutes stipulate that any person interested in challenging Dr Chimilio has to submit a letter of interest through Dr. Chimilio’s appointees. So here we are again with Dr Chimilio at helm of Belizean football after twelve years and going for sixteen. All hail the Emperor of Belizean football, Dr. Bertie Chimilio……….!
I think Dr Chimilio should do all a favor and step down as nobody likes him. He is just another dictator…He should return to doing what he is skilled in…vet services….then again…that no pay like football.
Well what’s new we have a dictator for Prime Minister and a dictator for football keep going and we will soon get to Venezuela or Cuba’s status.
this guys is a sucker since he has been elected for this post, with this scum we’ll never reach no where and we’ll end up being the laughing stock of the concacaf and other international football organizations. Why the hell is he still there? we need someone with visions not greed. This really sucks. He talks about being opposed by political parties which is not true it’s we the fans for the national team that have been fed up with his low performance with not reaching the level we should be internationaly in stadiums and couches. Hope we don’t find him dead like Mr. Morris, enemity he has collected country wide so let him know that people are no longer will to stay low but to take it away by any means nowadays.
we can whine all we want . Chimilo organization has a set of statutes which FIFA recognises. As long as Chimilio is operating within the guidelines of those statutes, FIFA will alwys honor the results of any election that we may deem suspect. What is needed is a thorough study of the Statutes and a directed thrust to change those articles of the statutes that allow the farce of a precluded Chimilio re-instatement to be perpetuated. As we work within Chimilio’s statutes, we create a document trail which will highlight the inconsistencies within the statutes and give us justifiable cause to seek redress from CONCACAF first and then FIFA second…that’s the only we can call Chimilio to account without government intervention and the FIFA suspension that is bound to follow.
I agree with you, Mossy. Untill and unless Bertie’s inner slight of hand gets exposed and dismantled, we can whine until we are blue in the face and FIFA won’t lift a finger in an attempt to sanction or remove him. Chimilio knows how the system works and he is milking it to the last drop to the detriment and frustration of football in the Jewel. The time has come for all lovers of the sport to rise up and make that “despot flee.”
Chimilio, Stop destroying Belizean Football. Do yourself a favor. retire the post…