Former Fiji Water Flying Fijians outside back, Semi Radradra has revealed that they had 3 players’ strikes against the Fiji Rugby Union at the 2023 Rugby World Cup in France which caused them to lose 3 games in the tournament just because of the delay in their pay.
Radradra revealed this during a live interview with Lesi Vanuavou.
Radradra says the first strike was before the game against Wales and the second strike was before the game against Portugal with the third one before the game against England.
He says the losses against Wales, Portugal and England were because of the players being mentally distracted with such issues.
He adds they had these strikes because some of the players were not paid for at least 3 weeks while some were not fully paid for weeks.
Former Flying Fijians captain Waisea Nayacalevu says the FRU is asking for evidence of his allegations against them but they themselves were breaching the contracts they have signed with the players after delaying their pay.
Nayacalevu says if the FRU had fulfilled the promises they made to the players, Fiji would have done wonders at the 2023 Rugby World Cup in France.
Nayacalevu says on the international level, players would be fully focused on the game ahead of them and not their pay if the FRU had stayed true to what they promised.
He adds it was better off if FRU did not make any promises that they could not fulfil.
Former Flying Fijians utility Lepani Botia says there should be a way that things need to be done in regards to paying the players in terms of what they have sacrificed for the team.
He says FRU cannot expect players to perform to the best of their ability when they are not paying the players well which affects the players’ mental preparation heading into a match.
Botia says players have their families that rely on them to provide for them from what they are earning as everything nowadays is all about the money.
He says when FRU promised them their payout, the players were all focused on giving their best performance to get awarded what they were promised and when the promise was not fulfilled, the players were questioning the captain along with some senior players as well as the manager and the former coach Simon Raiwalui.
Botia says they had to deal with young players coming to them asking them when will the FRU pay them the promised bonus.
He says he has been playing for Fiji for the past 10 years, and these alleged corrupt practices have always been there.
Botia adds they are speaking out for the betterment of the players’ welfare especially when these players leaving behind the roles they have to play at home, to go out and represent the country only to be treated inappropriately, especially with their pay.
He says they have raised these issues many times, especially with their pay, but nothing has been done.
Former captain, Waisea Nayacalevu along with former reps Lepani Botia and Semi Radradra have revealed that former coach Simon Raiwalui and other senior players in the squad to the 2023 Rugby World Cup had to fork out money from their own pockets to share with the local players after their game against Georgia.
Nayacalevu, Botia and Radradra highlighted that they had to use their own money as their pay was delayed.
The players say they had to buy the meals for the local players as well.
We have sent questions to FRU’s Interim Chair, Peter Mazey.
On issues that have been raised by Waisea Nayacalevu and other players regarding payments, Mazey says the Trustees have engaged an independent Accounting Auditor to review all payments.
Former Flying Fijians captain, Waisea Nayacalevu says he has decided to speak out about the way the Fiji rugby players have been treated by the Fiji Rugby Union in relation to delayed pay issues and promises not being kept because he is thinking of all the players that have been affected and also for the future of all Fijian rugby players.
While speaking in a facebook discussion with a Lesi Vanuavou, Nayacalevu and senior player, Semi Radradra shared how the coaches and senior players have had to use their own money because the credit card given by the FRU to the Manager on tour had no money.
The senior players have had to pay for the meals of the local players and the coaches even had to pay for the laundry.
Nayacalevu and Radradra also say the players from the 2019 World Cup were only paid 50 percent of what they were promised, and that is the reason why they pushed for the pay and bonuses to be paid before they played England in the 2023 Rugby World Cup quarter final.
This even resulted in Nayacalevu making it clear to the FRU for the promised money to be paid or the players would boycott the quarter final.
While responding to the Fiji Rugby Union statement that the players have been paid, Nayacalevu, Radradra and senior player, Lepani Botia have said today that they have not received the $105,000 payment per player from the 2023 Rugby World Cup.
Nayacalevu also says he had also asked to have zoom meetings with the FRU Interim Chair, Peter Mazey however Mazey did not attend any of the sessions.
He says they as players are putting their bodies on the line for Fiji, and the debts of the FRU is not their problem.
Nayacalevu and Botia say they know the sponsors and World Rugby provides funding to the FRU, and they are asking why this is not being utilised to make payments to the players and coaches on time.
We have been trying to get the FRU.
On issues that have been raised by Waisea Nayacalevu and other players regarding payments, Mazey says the Trustees have engaged an independent Accounting Auditor to review all payments.
The Fiji Rugby Football Union Trustees have engaged an independent Accounting Auditor to review all payments to all players including bonuses.
Fiji Rugby Interim Chair Peter Mazey highlighted this to fijivillage News in response to statements made by former Fiji Water Flying Fijians skipper Waisea Nayacalevu and other players raising concerns of late payments and unpaid bonuses.
Mazey says this is to ascertain if anybody is missed out and they will immediately ensure that it is corrected.
He says according to their records, it shows that everyone has been paid.
The Interim Chair says the Trustees rely on the information they have been given.
He says they did facilitate the final bonus payment by obtaining a overdraft facility so the players could get it immediately until the government was able to do it because they have processes and can’t make instant payments.
When asked on how they can guarantee this does not happen in the future, Mazey says that is why they are investigating it to see why, how long and how it has been happening.
Mazey says once they have those answers, they will ensure that the High Performance Unit has the right processes and procedures in place as well as their finance departments.
He says while the government was a main contributor to the Rugby World Cup last year with $2.5 million, the whole campaign cost just under $10 million.
Mazey says the Fiji Water sponsorship was from Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka speaking to the owners and they are very grateful for that sponsorship which has just been renewed.
He hopes that the players speaking out won’t cause any of the sponsors to withdraw.
When asked on comments made by Lepani Botia and Semi Radradra who were asked to pay their own airfares and are still awaiting reimbursement, Mazey says he doesn’t know anything about it and this will definitely be part of what they are looking at.
Mazey says when they came in as Trustees, one of the things that the players and the then Head Coach Simon Raiwalui asked for was if they could have contracts for the players.
He says in association with the Pacific Players Association they had put together a fixed term player contract by the Association and the FRU and each player signed it.
Former Fiji Water Flying Fijians skipper Waisea Nayacalevu along with former reps Lepani Botia and Semi Radradra have revealed that former coach Simon Raiwalui and other senior players in the squad to the 2023 Rugby World Cup had to fork out money from their own pockets to share with the local players after their game against Georgia.
During a live interview with a Lesi Vanuavou, Nayacalevu, Botia and Radradra highlighted that they had to use their own money as their pay was delayed.
The players say they had to buy the meals for the local players as well.
Nayacalevu says this has been an ongoing issue for years where the FRU promises players to pay them a certain amount of money or bonuses after tournaments but they fail to see their promises through.
He says this should not be happening at the international level.
Semi Radradra has also revealed that most of the players that went for the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Tokyo have not been fully paid to date.
Radradra says they were promised that they will be paid half of the salary before they left for Tokyo and will receive the remainder of their salary when they come back from Tokyo.
He says this is why they fought hard for the pay to be fully paid to the players before the 2023 RWC quarter final match against England to prevent the same incident that happened in 2019.
We are awaiting a response from Interim Chair of the Fiji Rugby Union, Peter Mazey.
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