After a contentious build up to the latest edition of Tanzania's most anticipated clash, the Kariakoo Derby between Tanzania Mainland Premier League giants Simba SC and Young Africans, Saturday's meeting has been postponed.
The controversy began on Friday when Simba were prevented from entering the Benjamin Mkapa Stadium to train at the venue that was set to play host to the match. The Reds put out a statement expressing their disappointment at the development as well as threatening to not honor the fixture due to these circumstances.
The controversy only gained more speed over the following hours, prompting the Tanzanian Premier League Board (TPLB) to issue a strongly worded statement warning Simba about potential consequences if they refused to take part in the match:
“The board of Premier League have received a complaint letter from Simba on the problems they faced before they face Yanga. As a board, we have taken into consideration Simba’s complaint and launched quick investigations over the matter."
“However, apart from that, we want to remind Simba that according to the league’s rules Article 15(10), any team that participates in the league must honour all the fixtures as released by the league’s board without fail. A team can only skip a match if they have tangible reasons that have been approved by the league body."
“If Simba fail to honour the game as per their letter, they will face disciplinary action as per Article 16(1), which is in line with team’s that don’t honour scheduled fixtures. And as per Article 17(45) which states that a team must train in a matchday venue before any given game, we will make sure that this is followed to the letter, and disciplinary action taken against those breaking and going against those rules."
Now the Tanzania Mainland Premier League board has issued a statement declaring Saturday's match to be postponed. In its statement the board acknowledged potential violations from both clubs and that an investigation in the coming days will allow it to make a judgement regarding any sanctions or punishments.
Key points from the statement as translated by Pan-Africa Football's Dennis Kegengo:
The league and competition committee met today, March 8 at Benjamin Mkapa Stadium, to discuss Simba's letter which raised a complaint that they were denied access to use matchday venue for training ahead of their Derby against Yanga.
After doing their investigation, the board found that Simba did not follow the right procedure to request for the use of the venue as required. Further, the committee found that Simba did not reach out to Yanga being the home team to request for the use of match venue.
However, the committee can confirm that those who blocked Simba from accessing the venue are from Yanga and in doing so the club breached Article 17(45) of the rules that governs the league.
But because the board is still doing further investigations over the matter, they have decided to postpone the game under Article 34:1 (1.3) as required in the law when postponing matches so that they can get more information on what transpired when Simba arrived at the match venue before delivering a proper ruling on the matter.
The Premier League board will issue it's final ruling in due course and will release a new date for the derby as quickly as possible.
Pan-Africa Football will provide any further updates as they develop.
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