Swimming South Africa president Allan Fitz will contest for the SASCOC (South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee) presidency at the end of the month.
Fritz has become the latest candidate to throw his hat into the ring for the eagerly awaited elections on the 28th of this month.
Fritz will be contesting with the likes of current acting SASCOC president Barry Hendricks and Athletics South Africa president Aleck Skhosana.
The election battle is set to be an ugly one with many candidates disqualified from contesting such as veteran administrator Ntambi Ravele, Skhosana, Netball South Africa president Cecilia Molokwane and Free State Rugby president Jerry Segwaba.
However, Fritz believes that the election process is fair.
Segwaba and Skhosana are rumoured to be challenging their disqualification. The three candidates were removed because they allegedly failed to submit all the required documentation.
Segwaba’s submission allegedly lacked a copy of his identity document, letter of good standing, abridged CV and manifesto, while Skhosana lacked a letter of good standing from his federation. Fritz says the process is cumbersome.
Former SASCOC president Gideon Sam is not allowed to run for the presidency due to age restriction.
The organisation internal squabbles have been well documented over the last few years, which led to the then minister of Sports Thokozile Xasa to institute the ministerial committee to investigate irregularities in the governance and management of SASCOC.
Fritz says there are big problems in the organisation.
There are some High-Performance Athletes who are part of the OPEX (Operation Excellence Programme).
The programme was started by SASCOC to assist top performing athletes with funding to prepare for major sporting events.
Fritz says athletes have not been receiving funding because of squabbles at SASCOC.
Swimming SA has been one of the best performing codes in the previous Olympics. The code earned team SA three silver medals at the 2016 Rio Olympics in Brazil.
They also contributed two gold medals and silver at the 2012 London Olympics.
Fritz says his federation is well run.
– Report by Vincent Sitsula
