By Ebube Dike

Perhaps, it is not only the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF that owe their senior national football team coach, you may say, just as the South Africa Football Association, SAFA is yet to pay their new coach, Hugo Broos, two months after he signed his contract, bestchoicesports.com.ng can report

However, the circumstances differ. Whereas NFF gave no reasons for owing Gernot Rohr months of unpaid salaries, Broos’ situation with SAFA is totally different.

Safa chief executive officer, Tebogo Motlanthe who confirmed that senior national team head coach Hugo Broos is yet to be paid his first monthly salary after signing the dotted paper in May, offered explanations

The Belgian tactician was officially appointed new Bafana Bafana head coach on May 5 – replacing local mentor Molefi Ntseki, who had failed to guide the team to the 2022 Africa Cup of Nations finals.

However, Broos returned home to have his second dosage of the Covid-19 vaccine and he missed Bafana’s friendly match against Uganda which was supposed to be his first match in charge of the team.

Bafana are currently competing in the 2021 Cosafa Cup under the guidance of caretaker coach Morena Ramoreboli with Broos’ local assistant Helman Mkhalele having tested positive for Covid-19 last week.

“When we appointed Hugo Broos as Bafana Bafana coach‚ we never made it a secret that he had taken his first Covid-19 jab in his native country and he would be going back for the second one,” Motlanthe told Sowetan.

“We said after getting the second jab‚ he would come back to South Africa and that would happen once the borders were open that side of the Netherlands to allow him into the country. That’s when his contract will officially commence.”

Motlanthe disclosed that Broos’ five-year deal with Safa will only commence as soon as he returns to South Africa with Bafana set to start their 2022 Fifa World Cup qualifying campaign in September this year.

“What we have agreed with him when he was here for the first time was that he was going to sign a contract‚ but the contract will commence as soon as he comes back into the country,” he continued.

“So no‚ [he is not drawing a salary from Safa at the moment] and we are also grateful that he agreed to the arrangement‚ despite the work he did when he was here.

“He was agreeable to the contract commencing when he comes back‚ but when he is going to come back is dependent on when the borders are open.”

Motlanthe is hopeful that the former Cameroon head coach will be back in the country ahead of Bafana’s first two World Cup qualifiers which are against Zimbabwe away and Ghana at home.

“We still believe that he will here in time to prepare the team for the World Cup qualifiers against Zimbabwe and Ghana‚” he added.

“We are in constant contact with him about what is happening in the Cosafa Cup‚ and also what will be happening in Japan regarding the SA under-23 team’s [participation] at the Olympics

“We hope that when he comes back he will have enough time to prepare Bafana for the World Cup qualifiers.”

South Africa failed to qualify for the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations AFCON holding in Cameroon next year.