The Parliamentary Education, Youth and Finance Committees discussed, during their meeting on Wednesday, the most prominent challenges facing football clubs in the professional league, as well as the clubs’ demands related to supporting them and enhancing their resources in light of the difficult financial conditions they are going through.

The head of the Parliamentary Education and Youth Committee, Dr. Talib Al-Sarayrah, said that the committee always seeks to stand by and support sports clubs, calling on the government and the Football Association to increase the financial support provided to clubs, especially during the current period in order to be able to advance the sports movement as the main incubator for youth.

The meeting was attended by: Secretary-General of the Ministry of Youth Hussein Jabour, Secretary-General of the Olympic Committee Nasser Majali, Secretary-General of the Jordan Football Association, Samar Nassar, Chairman of the Players Status Committee in the Federation Muhammad Samara, and a number of club representatives.

Sarayrah pointed out the importance of the clubs’ role in finding radical, not immediate, solutions to the challenges facing football, in partnership and cooperation with all concerned parties and finding investments that serve the clubs.

He said that the financial conditions of the clubs and the penalties imposed on them, negatively affected their performance, in addition to the fact that some of them reached the point of bankruptcy, which raises fear among many about the future of sports in Jordan, adding that some of them have a rich sports history.
Sarayrah called for the necessity of benefiting from the experiences of European clubs in investing in football talents, by establishing specialized sports schools and academies.

Chairman of the Parliamentary Finance Committee, Muhammad Al-Saudi, for his part, stressed the need for all corners of the game to cooperate to reach the professional work followed in all international leagues, stressing the importance of developing the football system and standing by the sports clubs.
He called on the government to bear part of the financial burdens imposed on sports clubs, by canceling the penalties imposed on them, and raising the budget for supporting clubs, especially “professionals.”

The deputies, in turn, called for the need to enact legislation that would support investment projects that benefit the clubs, and reduce the financial demands arising from them, in cooperation with the private sector, calling at the same time the necessity of converting clubs into companies.

For her part, Nassar reviewed the tasks carried out by the Federation and the work strategy, praising the efforts of His Highness Prince Ali bin Al Hussein, President of the Jordan Football Association, with these trends and the successes achieved during his reign.

She stressed that the federation is concerned with serving the clubs and removing all the challenges they face, calling for an increase in the support provided to the federation, so that it can continue to continue its primary role and achieve the goals for which it was established.

Nassar said that the debts of professional clubs range between 9 and 10 million dinars.

For their part, the heads of the clubs, the federation and the government demanded an increase in financial allocations for the clubs, and work to find incentives to facilitate the granting of bank loans to the clubs, in addition to creating an infrastructure compatible with the name of the professional league, and to overcome all challenges to the clubs’ work so that Jordanian football remains in the advanced ranks.

In addition, Jabour confirmed that the Ministry of Youth provides 16,000 dinars for each professional league club, in addition to the periodic maintenance of sports complexes and infrastructure.

He pointed out that the clubs’ financial problem is very big, and solutions must be developed to ensure that it does not aggravate.

While Al-Majali stressed the need to work on finding radical solutions to ensure sustainability, which requires clubs to work hard through a real partnership with the private sector and actual investment in order to overcome the financial deficit.