Pascalinah Kabi
MASERU — The Lesotho Football Association (Lefa) has taken over the responsibility of paying referees officiating first division matches starting this season.
A Division teams have been responsible for paying match officials — M75 a game — for the past years.
Although Lefa has taken over, the match fee for the referees remains unchanged.
Match officials handling Vodacom Premier League matches get M100 a game.
The first division campaign kicked off yesterday with all 20 teams in action this weekend.
“Each referee is going to get M75 and all the three match officials will be paid after each match,” Rethusitsoe Lebaka, spokesperson for the Lesotho Referees Association, told the Sunday Express.
“The teams have shown that they cannot afford to pay referees anymore so they asked Lefa to intervene.”
A Division spokesperson Mosebo Motsoasele however told the Sunday Express that Lefa should have started paying referees last season.
He claimed Vodacom Lesotho, domestic football’s biggest sponsor, had given the football mother body M40 000 to pay match officials.
“It was supposed to have happened last (season) but it never happened,” Motsoasele said.
“This is because there is M40 000 which was supposed to have been used for paying A Division referees.
“Vodacom gave it for referees although we were only informed verbally about it.”
