Pres­i­dent of the T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion David John-Williams is call­ing out his op­po­nents in the up­com­ing T&T Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion Elec­tions on No­vem­ber 24- William Wal­lace of the Unit­ed TTFA and Richard Fer­gu­son, to a de­bate at a date and time to be de­ter­mined be­fore the elec­tion.

He al­so wants Kei­th Look Loy, who he be­lieves is the de­fac­to pres­i­dent of the Unit­ed TTFA slate, to be in­clud­ed in the de­bate, al­though he in­sists, should be strict­ly for the pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates. On Wednes­day in an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia Sports, John-Williams said the de­bate will be strict­ly about the is­sues of foot­ball and will be used to de­ter­mine who is the right man to guide the sport of foot­ball for the next four years.

John-Williams' tenure has been tar­nished by is­sues of trans­paren­cy and ac­count­abil­i­ty, poor qual­i­ty of the lo­cal game at all lev­els, the con­struc­tion of the now-con­tro­ver­sial Home of Foot­ball and the con­trac­tors, and de­ci­sions that ap­pear to have sunken foot­ball fur­ther in­to the abyss of debt.

How­ev­er, the for­mer W Con­nec­tion Chief Ex­ec­u­tive Of­fi­cer (CEO), gleam­ing with con­fi­dence as he dis­played the spank­ing new Home of Foot­ball fa­cil­i­ty on Wednes­day, in­tend­ed to be used as a rev­enue-gen­er­at­ing mea­sure that will make the sport and the cash-strapped foot­ball as­so­ci­a­tion self-sus­tain­able in the fu­ture, be­lieves the de­bate should be crit­i­cal for the coun­try to see the type of per­sons lob­by­ing to man­age the af­fairs of the sport.

John-Williams who was the last to of­fi­cial­ly an­nounce his can­di­da­ture for the elec­tions, will be sup­port­ed by vice pres­i­dents Sel­by Browne, Col­in Par­tap of the Cen­tral Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (CFA) and An­tho­ny Moore of the To­ba­go Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion (TFA), while Wal­lace's team will com­prise Sam Phillip, Clynt Tay­lor (CFA) and Su­san Joseph-War­rick of the Women's Foot­ball League.

Fer­gu­son's team, how­ev­er, will on­ly have Shymdeo Go­sine (CFA) and Ray­mond Thom of T&T Pro League cam­paign­ers Po­lice FC, since his oth­er mem­ber Ed­di­son Dean of Club San­do, pulled out to sup­port the Unit­ed TTFA.

In an im­me­di­ate re­sponse on Wednes­day, the Unit­ed TTFA, in a re­lease said it will not en­gage in any de­bate among the pres­i­den­tial can­di­dates.

"For four years David John-Williams has stead­fast­ly re­fused to pro­vide in­for­ma­tion to TTFA mem­bers and the gen­er­al pub­lic. The in­for­ma­tion which it is their right to have. In­deed, one TTFA Board mem­ber, Kei­th Look Loy, was forced to re­sort re­peat­ed­ly to the High Court to wrest in­for­ma­tion from the TTFA Pres­i­dent. With the TTFA elec­tions mere days away David John-Williams has em­barked on a pro­gramme of po­lit­i­cal gim­mick­ry."

It added, "Unit­ed TTFA has un­veiled a de­tailed pro­gramme for the sal­va­tion of TTFA and T&T foot­ball. We have bus­ied our­selves in a dis­cus­sion of our pro­gramme with the TTFA elec­torate. We will not par­tic­i­pate in David John-Williams' cyn­i­cal cha­rade, his pre­tence of seek­ing de­mo­c­ra­t­ic dis­course."

Mean­while, FI­FA Pres­i­dent Gi­an­ni In­fan­ti­no is set to touch down for the of­fi­cial in­au­gu­ra­tion of the Home Of Foot­ball on Mon­day. In­fan­ti­no, in on­ly his sec­ond vis­it to the twin-is­land Re­pub­lic, will join Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley in open­ing the spank­ing new foot­ball fa­cil­i­ty in Bal­main Cou­va.

In­fan­ti­no's last vis­it here was for the sod-turn­ing cer­e­mo­ny of the fa­cil­i­ty in 2017. This time, how­ev­er, he will be ac­com­pa­nied by CON­CA­CAF pres­i­dent Vic­tor Mon­tagliani and oth­er of­fi­cials from FI­FA and CON­CA­CAF.