DENNIS Chung, general secretary of Jamaica Football Federation (JFF), wants the Government to reduce the rental cost or even grant free usage for the National Stadium for hosting international matches.

He said that it costs the JFF over two million dollars to rent the National Stadium from the Jamaican Government-owned Independence Park Limited (IPL), the operators of the facility.

Chung noted the case of fellow Caribbean country Trinidad and Tobago where national teams are given free access to Hasely Crawford Stadium by the Government for commercial use. They are only required to cover the cost of using the lights at the facility.

“We wish that we were like Trinidad where we either got it free or at a discounted rate, but I guess that it’s a different country that can afford that,” said the veteran businessman.

“It would certainly work in our favour if this should happen but we haven’t asked them to do it; we just go with it. I guess they have their own financial issues to deal with, but if we got that opportunity it would definitely be one that we would welcome.

“It would help the federation, and it would also benefit the football programmes if that were the case. Definitely, I would love for them to do this because it would relieve a lot of pressure on us regarding the cost of renting the National Stadium,” Chung noted.

Efforts to get a comment from Minister of Sports Olivia Grange proved futile as several calls to her mobile phone went unanswered up to press time on Saturday.

IPL General Manager Major Desmon Brown said any implementation of such a policy would have to come from the Government of Jamaica.

“You can use the Trinidad stadium free of cost but we don’t have that kind of funding to do that,” he said.

“To offer the facility free of charge to people like the JFF would be a decision taken by the Government; IPL cannot make those decisions. IPL has a mandate and we have to work within that mandate, so it is not a matter of whether we can afford it or not — those are decisions the Government will have to make,” Brown added.

According to Chung, JFF is required to pay one million dollars upfront to IPL before they can access the stadium.

“We pay our money upfront all the time. The Trinidad Government gives their national teams access to the stadium free of cost because national programmes carry a certain amount of prestige for the country and also help from a social standpoint,” he said.

He said that JFF would run the risk of not having access to the National Stadium if the down payment is not made.

“I know that in the past we’ve faced situations where they said if we don’t pay, they are going to lock us out of the stadium. One of the ongoing challenges for the JFF is finding that money upfront — even before we recover a dollar from the gate.

“We have never had that problem in Montego Bay where we had to pay upfront but we have faced this issue in Kingston [National Stadium],” Chung lamented.

However, Brown disclosed that while associations and federations are charged a fee for staging commercial events at the IPL facilities, they are given free access for practice.

“The [Jamaican] Government does do something, though, because whenever they are selecting national teams for training, the sporting associations are allowed to use the facilities free of cost but for commercial activities — like when you are charging people to enter the facility — then you have to pay rent. However, when they are using the facility for training they don’t pay rent,” Brown said.