FIFA has disbanded the Board of the Trinidad and Tobago Football Association (TTFA) with immediate effect and will appoint a normalization committee to run the affairs of football in the twin-island republic. The decision was made today by the Bureau of the FIFA Council in accordance with article 8.2 of the FIFA Statutes.

Article 8.2 states simply that: ‘Executive bodies of member associations may under exceptional circumstances be removed from office by the Council in consultation with the relevant confederation and replaced by a normalisation committee for a specific period of time.’

According to a FIFA statement, the decision to disband the TTFA’s Board ‘follows the recent FIFA/Concacaf fact-finding mission to Trinidad and Tobago to assess, together with an independent auditor, the financial situation of TTFA’.

FIFA claimed that: ‘the mission found that extremely low overall financial management methods, combined with a massive debt, have resulted in the TTFA facing a very real risk of insolvency and illiquidity. Such a situation is putting at risk the organization and development of football in the country and corrective measures need to be applied urgently.’

The normalization committee, according to the FIFA statement, will be composed of an adequate number of members to be identified by the FIFA administration, in consultation with Concacaf.

In line with the FIFA Governance Regulations, all members of the normalization committee will be subject to an eligibility check.

The mandate of the normalization committee will include the following:

– run the TTFA’s daily affairs;

– establish a debt repayment plan that is implementable by the TTFA;

– review and amend the TTFA Statutes (and other regulations where necessary) and to ensure their compliance with the FIFA Statutes and requirements before duly submitting them for approval to the TTFA Congress;

– organize and conduct elections of a new TTFA executive committee for a four-year mandate.

The normalization committee will act as an electoral committee, and none of its members will be eligible for any of the open positions at the upcoming TTFA elections under any circumstances. The specified period of time during which the normalization committee will perform its functions will expire as soon as it has fulfilled all of its assigned tasks—but it has a limit of 24 months after the official appointment of members by FIFA.