By Dipo Olowookere
Somali Football federation has on Wednesday concluded the first FIFA youth refereeing course to be conducted in the country under the auspice of the world football’s governing association.
Somali football federation senior vice president, Mr Ali Abdi Mohamed, who addressed at the closing ceremony of the course on Wednesday, said that the need for education is always there.
“Education and development are two things which are always important for the humans, because we are people and people must always think about their development. Somali football federation is always prioritizing education and progress and that is why development courses are held by the federation” Mr Mohamed said before handing over the microphone to SFF president, Abdiqani Said Arab.
The president thanked FIFA for helping Somalia football to develop despite the difficult situation in the country.
“Thanks to FIFA for always giving particular considerations to our requests for development, FIFA was always and is still investing Somalia football in many ways” Somali Football Federation (SFF) president, Abdiqani Said Arab noted during his closing speech.
“As shown in our activity plans, local competitions in the country will increase by 2017. Like so, SFF is planning to increase the quality and quantity of football referees in Somalia, because to organize more competitions, we have to increase the number of our referees first and that is why we have been organizing more local and international level refereeing courses for the past two years” the president explained.
“In our football history it has never happened that two FIFA-level refereeing courses were held in Somalia within a year and we are planning to increase this again with the help from FIFA, because refereeing is a very important sector in the football industry and we are committed to developing that important sector” president Abdiqani Said Arab noted.
The course brought together some 30 young age referees from across the country and they were all awarded with their certificates except two referees who failed in fitness test.
Modupe Gbadeyanka