Caribbean Football Union partners with English FA

Officials from the English FA, including the International President of England’s 2018 World Cup Bid team, David Dein, were expected to arrive last night.

The partnership will see the FA co-hosting the CFU’s annual gala dinner, which is scheduled to take place on Friday at the Port-of-Spain Ballroom of the Hyatt Regency Hotel.

This is the first time since the CFU’s inception it has partnered with any other Football Association to host activities associated with their Congress.

FIFA Vice-President and CFU President, Jack Warner has described the pairing as simply, “the materialising of family ties.”

“The English FA and the CFU are part of the same family. We are the family of football. The English FA has always been a friend of the Caribbean region and any friendship is essentially a partnership.

“In light of the harsh economic conditions we are battling in the region the FA has agreed to formally partner with us to host the dinner. It is an offer which I have agreed to,” Warner said.

“The principles of team work behest us to abet our fellow team members when their strength is beneath ordinary at a particular point in time. The Caribbean Football Union faces unique challenges but despite of geographical disadvantage, we have confronted all challenges and despite the nature of the demur, we have emerged the winner,” Warner said.

England’s newly appointed Internation-al President of the 2018 bid team, Dein, is expected to address the gala function on Friday night. Dein, a former vice chairman of English football power club Arsenal, was appointed to his position less than two weeks ago and his visit to the CFU President and the Caribbean Region is one of his first international trips since being appointed.

Members of the FA are also expected to address the Ordinary Congress meeting which is scheduled to take place on the Saturday.

Over the next week, the 30 Member Associations of the CFU will meet to discuss a number of issues relating to the development of football in the region, especially Haiti.

Haiti was brought to its knees over a month ago after a massive earthquake destroyed several parts of the island, since then the Caribbean nation has been attempting to return to a sense of normalcy.

Thirty two members of the Haitian Federation perished in the earthquake, which also destroyed the Federation’s headquarters.

Since then, CFU President Warner, who has donated US$100,000 of his personal funds, has been spearheading a number of relief efforts.

Warner has stated that he will continue to use his international offices to raise awareness of the gravity of the situation which has been inflicted on his Caribbean brothers and sisters.

These efforts have resulted in an unprecedented donation by FIFA of over US$3 million. This pledge was made after Warner presented a report to FIFA’s Finance Committee earlier this month.