True! Bong County Kickball Players Refused to Leave Camp Without Salaries
Claim: National County Sports Meet, 3rd Place Winner Bong County resists leaving camp until full payment is done
Source: Jerome C Willie Jr.
Verdict: True! The Bong County Kickball Team resisted leaving camp until full payment of their salaries was done.
Full Text: The Bong County Kickball Team is one of the 15 teams that participated in the Kickball category of the 2024/2025 National County Sports meet.
The team qualified from the group stage that was hosted in central Liberia and again won its quarterfinal match against Gbarpolu County.
The team did not qualify for the final as they were defeated by Grand Kru County 6-3. However, the county clinched the 3rd place position against Grand Gedeh County in the 2024/2025 National County Sports Meet.
Almost a week after their 3rd place victory, Jerome C. Willie Jr., a Liberian journalist, posted on his Facebook page that the team has refused to leave because the county sports steering committee has allegedly refused to pay them.
Verification: To verify his claim, we contacted the Deputy Public Relations Officer of the 2024/2025 Sports Steering Committee, Freddy Gayflor, who confirmed to us that the team earlier refused to leave their camp.
Gayflor said the team should have left the camp on Sunday right after the match but because the county is still indebted to them, they chose to remain there to get their money.
“It was agreed that the players will leave the camp right after the game to cut down expenses but you know they too have been afraid that they would not get their money if they leave,” Freddy said.
He failed to disclose when the payment to the players will be done but said the players have been asked to be patient until the payment is done.
Gayflor said following those appeals by the steering committee, the players finally decided to leave the camp on February 7.
We also contacted Fofena Kamara, one of the players of the basketball team, who told us that they never wanted to leave but decided to because of an appeal from the steering committee.
To further authenticate all of these different verifications, we reached out to the Head Coach of Kickball, Dahnjulu Sawmadal.
Sawmadal, in a very short telephone interview, said it was a decision taken by the players to remain on camp until their salaries are paid. He said the players later understood the constraints so they chose to leave yesterday.
“The more we stayed at that place, the more the bill increases on the steering committee so we were able to talk with players to bear with the steering committee up to next week,” he said.
Conclusion: Based on all of our factual findings, we can say, Yes, the claim is true that the players had refused to leave camp without their salaries. But they later left without the money after several appeals by the Sports Steering Committee
Written by : Joseph T. Yekeryan, Bong County Fellow
