Danny Jordaan’s attempt to declare his arrest unlawful falls through

South African Football Association (SAFA) President Danny Jordaan’s legal team’s attempt to declare his arrest, and that of his two accused, unlawful has failed. This was the second time Jordaan launched a legal bid against his arrest. Late on Tuesday, the 73-year-old Jordaan attempted to evade arrest by filing for an urgent interdict at the Specialised Commercial Crimes Court in Palm Ridge.

His efforts were unsuccessful as he was arrested together with his two co-accused Gronie Hluyo SAFA’s chief financial officer, and businessman Trevor Neethling.

Then on Thursday, another attempt was made by Jordaan’s legal team to approach the Johannesburg High Court to declare the arrest of the three individuals unlawful. But that was also unsuccessful with the case removed from the court roll, and was not part of the cases to be heard on Thursday.

Jordaan’s star as an administrator shone so brightly that he received special praise from former president Nelson Mandela many years ago. He looked destined to illuminate the highest office in world football by shooting to the top seat at FIFA.

But the head of SAFA now finds himself in hot water.

Jordaan and his two co-accused were each granted R20,000 bail, at the Palm Ridge Specialised Commercial Crimes Court, east of Johannesburg, on Wednesday where he sat in the dock to answer to charges of fraud and theft.

He is accused of using R1.3 million of SAFA’s money for his own benefit without proper authorisation.

According to a law expert, Kevin Smith, Jordaan is facing very serious charges.

“Look, a case of this nature, we can’t understate the seriousness and that hinges on a few things … not just on the gravity of the charges themselves, but the amount that is being claimed. It’s an amount in the excess of R1.3 million. So, based on that alone, it is a serious matter. but even more egregious than that is what the charges are actually hinged on. It is Mr Jordaan and his fellow accused having used their positions of power and positions of influence for their own personal gain,” explains Smith.

Now, it is believed some members of SAFA’s National Executive Committee want to bring a motion for Jordaan to step aside as president while he handles his legal woes. But the strong power the 73-year-old wields over the 47-member body means that motion is unlikely to pass.

Moreover, there is no step aside rule at SAFA, and everyone remains innocent until proven guilty.

Smith says it’s up to Jordaan to decide how to handle the issue without causing too much damage to football.

“There’s the criminal and legal aspect; there’s the reputational aspect of himself and there’s the reputational aspect of the bodies that he is serving in. All of those now need to be taken in mind and all of those need to be protected and to the extent that he does choose to step down, it needs to be made clear that he is not stepping down as a sign of guilt or an admission of guilt. Even though those things aren’t implied, it has to be made clear to protect all reputations,” adds Smith.

It is said that Jordaan used the R1.3 million to pay for his security ahead of the 2018 elections, and the appointment of PR company Grit Communications, owned by Neethling.

Brand expert Tumi Rabanye says the arrest of Jordaan is an opportunity for SAFA to make some serious introspection.

“The big question we have to ask is whether the entire fraternity would stake the reputation of the fraternity on one man. I think it’s one question to ask, there’s also the question around longevity of leadership, and for SAFA specifically, and I think there’s a separate issue here. There’s the issues of the law, the policies that they have in place, governance, integrity being a very big thing and indeed the integrity of the fraternity is at stake as reflected by Danny Jordaan,” explains Rabanye.

Jordaan and his co-accused will be back in court on the 5th of December.

Whether Danny Jordaan steps aside or not amid corruption charges is up to him: Legal expert