Rollers hold controversial Special Meeting

Lekopanye Mooketsi | Tuesday October 8, 2013 00:40

A faction of the team has taken the Rollers leadership to court arguing that the club cannot hold a meeting when there is a pending court case. Gaborone lawyer, Tefo Sibanda who is representing the faction in court, said on Friday he wrote a letter to the management warning them against holding the Saturday meeting. He said he warned that they could not hold the meeting whose agenda was already a subject of a court matter. Sibanda said it was clear that the people who called the meeting were trying to prejudge a legal matter and this to him amounts to contempt of court.

However, Masonya said they decided to go ahead with their meeting because there was no court order to stop them. He said if anyone wanted to stop the meeting, they should have applied for a court order. 'Some people did not want the meeting to proceed because of their own reasons.  They wrote to us but there was not court order,' he said.He added that during the meeting, they never discussed anything related to the pending case.  'People should not speculate on what we were going to discuss,' he said. Even though there were fears that things might turn ugly at the Saturday meeting at the Botswana National Youth Council (BNYC) premises in Gaborone West, Masonya said there were no ugly incidents.  'Everything went peacefully. 

Everyone was happy about the outcome of the meeting,' he declared.

Masonya said the meeting was called by the general membership to clarify certain issues and they will divulge what was discussed and agreed after internal briefings. He said the Saturday gathering made follow ups on the resolutions adopted during the meeting held at Maikano School in November last year.  He said the minutes of the Maikano meeting were adopted at the Saturday meeting. He said as per the Maikano meeting resolutions, they co-opted new members into the executive committee. One of the new members is gospel artist Bafana Pheto who becomes the public relations officer of the club.

Rollers chairman, Spencer Mmui whose group has moved to court said the Saturday meeting was illegal. 'That meeting was unconstitutional and illegal because we have a matter pending in court,' he charged. He said according to the Rollers constitution, the chairman is the one who is supposed to order the secretary to call a meeting but this did not happen. But Masonya has countered that this is only true as far as an annual general meeting is concerned but not a special meeting which can be called the general membership.

Rollers  has been divided into factions over the proposed privatisation of the club. Mmui and his faction are against the manner in which the privatisation is being undertaken and the allocation of shares for the company that will be owning the club.