Head of FIFA Legal Affairs Division Primo Carvalho, who served as football world governing body's representative at yesterday's Gambia Football Federation (GFF) elective congress, has pledged his organisation's support to the new leadership of Gambian football.

Carvalho who was speaking at a post-election press conference at the Paradise Suites Hotel in Kololi on Wednesday said he is going to report back to FIFA that the normalisation process of Gambian football is over, so it is for the world football governing body and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to develop their new programmes for the country.

"We have a new programme that has been set up two months ago and it is called 'Performance'. It is a tailor-made programme for each of the associations, meaning you will have a team of specialists coming to your country and assessing in all different aspects. We work with a strategic plan to improve the strength or work on the weaknesses, so that is one thing that will be done in The Gambia."

He said the new Constitution was jointly put in place in consultation with FIFA, CAF and the Normalisation Committee as well as the stakeholders, noting that FIFA is interested in seeing football develop in all the regions of the Gambia. He added: "And this is very important for the beauty of Gambian football, but also for the beauty that the game comes with." When asked why he seemed unhappy compared to the buoyant mood he was in after the adoptive congress, Primo replied. "Of course if I have been overjoyed on an election of someone then I would have been criticised on how come I am overjoyed. But I am so happy that now there is a new president or leadership, which was the FIFA and CAF goal. We had been happier when the new Constitution was adopted because that was a big challenge and very important for FIFA and CAF that GFF would now have a new, good, balanced, and a healthier structure," he said, before embracing the president-elect of the GFF Mustapha Kebbeh.

Carvalho further warned that there is still a lot of work to be done and said both FIFA and CAF will continue to monitor the situation closely. He also congratulated the members of the Normalisation Committee for a job well done, positing that Gambia is lucky to have senior and 'credible' people still contributing in the game.

Primo Carvalho reminded the newly elected executive committee members that before FIFA releases funds for national associations, they require accountability on how their monies already given out was spent. "So now we still need the new executive to give us (FIFA) some accountability on what had been done before, because FIFA will not provide money until we get the answer we are entitled to get," he concluded.