BUDAPEST, Hungary – Antigua and Barbuda general secretary Gordon Derrick was elected president of the Caribbean Football Union on Tuesday along with all eight members of the organization’s executive committee.
The 43-year-old Derrick, who has been Antigua general secretary since 2004, prevailed out of a field of four, including Luis Hernandez of Cuba, Ronald Jones of Barbados and Harold Taylor of Trinidad & Tobago. He begins a four-year term replacing Jack Warner, who was elected for a sixth time in February 2011 but resigned four months later.
The elections at the CFU congress culminated the need for the CFU’s Normalization Committee, which was formed to quell the turmoil left in the wake of Warner’s resignation.
“Rest assured there will be no marginalization, discrimination or segregation under my tenure,” Derrick told the CFU congress following the vote. “We are all vital components of this union, each and every member has a part to play and it is only through unity can we move the union forward.”
Besides Derrick, the congress also elected Cheney Joseph of Grenada as first vice president, Larry Mussenden of Bermuda as second vice president, Lyndon Cooper of St. Lucia as third vice president, Canover Watson of the Cayman Islands as fourth vice president and Sonia Bien-Aime (Turks and Caicos Islands), Hillaren Frederick (U.S. Virgin Islands) , Maurice Victoire (Martinique), and Anthony Johnson (St. Kitts and Nevis) as board members.
Bien-Aime becomes the first woman to be chosen for a CFU executive post.
The congress also heard from Cayman Islands Football Association President Jeffrey Webb, who headed the Normalization Committee for its five-month existence and is the only nominated candidate for Wednesday’s CONCACAF presidential election.
Webb noted the panel’s work leading up to Tuesday’s election, which also included the ratification of new statutes, registration of the CFU as a not-for-profit organization and the disbursement of funds to member associations from its television rights contract.
Source: CONCACAF
