Sierra Leone qualification bids in dangerBy KEMO CHAM in Freetown | Tuesday, May 29  2012 at  14:59

Sierra Leone World Cup bid could be in danger due to continued interference by the court, the country’s football association said.

The Sierra Leone Football Association (SFA) public relations officer, Ibrahim Sorie Sesay, said the country could also fail to qualify for the Nations Cup if the trend continued.

Last week, the High Court in Freetown ordered SFA secretariat locked out of the offices and the associonly bus belonging to the association impounded following a suit filed by a construction company.

The company is suing SFA for failure to pay $67,000 for construction of a Fifa project; Sierra Leone Football Academy.

According to Sesay, SFA did not write to Fifa to release payments for the company because the work was not yet complete.

“If we do not have access to our offices, it will affect us in our pending international matches,” said Sesay.

The national team, the Leone Stars, are set to clash with Cape Verde at home this Saturday, to be followed by an away match to Equatorial Guinea on June 9, as part of the 2014 World Cup qualifiers.

A travel agency

A third match is with São Tomé and Príncipe in Freetown on June 15, being the second leg of the Leone Stars` Africa Cup of Nations first round qualifier.

But all this could prove disastrous, according to Sesay, if the court`s decision was not reversed.

The impounded FA vehicle is used to transport teams from the Premier, First and Second divisions to attend league matches.

Sesay said SFA officials throughout the country were now working from internet cafés, hampering effective communication.

The closure of the FA secretariat came as the football loving nation nursed a string of losses by the national team in the hands of Jordan and Iraq, last week.

In December last year, the same Freetown High Court ordered the closure of the offices of the FA over a dispute with a travel agency.

A similar experience was in 2010 when SFA found itself in a dispute with the National Revenue Authority.

The FA was engrossed in a series of controversies that have been blamed on administrative deficiencies.

It is scheduled for elections later this July.