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Ghana Football Association (GFA) president, Kwesi Nyantakyi, has described the death of  former FA Chairman, Ben Koufie, as “yet another huge loss that has robbed Ghana and Africa of one of the game’s best brains.
 
Mr Nyantakyi, who led a delegation of football administrators to commiserate with Koufie’s widow and family yesterday, said it was painful and sad that Koufie’s stature and immense technical gift would be taken away.

“However, his was a life well lived and we can only pray for his gentle soul to rest in peace," Nyantakyi said in reaction.
A distraught Francis Oti Akenten, the Technical Director of the GFA who worked closely with Mr Koufie, said his death was a big loss to CAF's technical development.

"Mr Koufie was instrumental in transforming the CAF instructors unit and his death will create a huge vaccuum. Even in his old age when he seemed to have slowed down physically, his contribution and indepth knowledge was apt.
A former GFA chairman, Dr Nyaho Nyaho-Tamakloe, praised the late Koufie for his legacy in the development of juvenile football in the country.

He said juvenile football enjoyed tremendous success under the watch of his predecessor although he believed Koufie’s tenure at the FA could have been more successful but for the interference of the Executive Committee.

For Premier League Board (PLB) chairman, Ashford Tettey-Oku, the late FA chairman, who passed on last Monday after a short illness, was “a complete and total football person” whose greatest legacy was a five-year comprehensive football development plan for Ghana.

Mr Tettey-Oku told the Graphic Sports yesterday that the blueprint for developing coaches, referees, footballers and administrators throughout the country, which underpinned the development plan put together during Koufie’s administration between 2001 and 2005, was his unmatched gift to Ghana football.

The PLB boss still has fond memories of his working relationship with the respected former national player, one-time Black Stars coach and administrator. In a tribute to the late football legend, the PLB boss revealed that Mr Koufie took a particular interest in his (Tettey-Oku’s) career and profession as far back as 1983, when Koufie worked as the head coach of Accra Hearts of Oak during the reign of Seth Abadjie.

“One thing I got to know about him was that he was a visionary who planned for the development of the game ahead of time. As two-time coach of Hearts, he convinced the administrators to establish the Hearts Rolands (Hearts 85) that produced the  90 per cent of the Musical Youth of 1986,” said Mr Tettey-Oku, until recently a long-standing General Secretary of Hearts.

Dr Nyaho-Tamakloe, who succeeded Mr Koufie as FA boss in 2005, noted that his predecessor’s great plans were undermined by an overbearing Executive Committee who did not allow him to run the football controlling body properly.
“His problem was that the Executive Committee did not allow him to run the FA properly,” he told the Graphic Sports yesterday, while eulogising the 84-year-old former Black Stars coach.

He said the 35-member Executive Committee members of the FA virtually run the football association and took major decisions at the expense of the then chairman.

“He said as soon as he took over, he started the crusade for the FA chairmanship to be elected as well as the position for the FA Executive Committee which he said was faced with a lot of resistance.”