KINGSTON, Jamaica —President of the Jamaica Football Federation (JFF), Michael Ricketts, unveiled his manifesto at the Wembley Centre of Excellence in Clarendon on Wednesday, as he expressed confidence that his administration will continue in power for another term.

Ricketts is being challenged for the top job by Vice-President Raymond Anderson, who has highlighted in his campaign that over the past six years in office with this current administration, he has not been able to truly transform the sport from the sidelines, thus spurring him to enter the race.

The JFF presidential election is scheduled for Sunday, January 14.

Despite ups and downs since taking office in 2017, Ricketts said that his team has done more than enough to grow the sport in the country and revealed that some US $1.9 million in royalties will go towards even more development for the sport.

Rudolph Speid, who is on Ricketts’ slate as a director, in delivering the 2024 to 2028 manifesto, said that an amount of the US$1.9 million of royalties from the Adidas contract will be allocated for football development programme over the next four year.

Ricketts’ slate includes vice-presidents Gregory Daley, Elaine Walker-Brown, Raymond Grant, and Baron Watson, as well as directors Rudolph Speid and Bruce Gaynor.

Anderson’s slate includes candidate vice-presidents Keith Wellington, Jacqueline Cummings-Martin, Donald Beckford, and Orville Powell, as well as Carole Beckford and Whycliffe “Dave” Cameron.

“I am pretty confident, we have the numbers and I am just waiting on Sunday,” Ricketts told Observer Online, highlighting the successes in procuring sponsorship for programmes, the federation’s kit sponsorship deal with sportswear giant Adidas among the administration’s major commercial achievements to date.

He also listed the achievement of the Senior Reggae Girlz making it to two consecutive World Cup tournaments as well creating history by making it to the round of 16 last year as major accomplishments for the JFF.

“I think that qualifying for two consecutive World Cup tournaments is one of our biggest achievements to date. But the partnership with Adidas is the largest partnership in football history. It is massive,” he said. “When some people try to beat us down, some of our own try to make us look bad, people overseas, people in the diaspora and globally, are very excited with what is happening in Jamaica.”

– Ruddy Allen