Front Line Op-Ed: Sports Leaders, Gratitude and the Accountability We Still Lack

Nuno Perestrelo0

Launched on 4 June 2026 in Record, Portugal’s leading sports newspaper, SIGA’s weekly opinion column Linha da Frente (Front Line, in Portuguese) provides a dedicated platform to address issues at the heart of SIGA’s global agenda, including Sport Integrity, good governance, transparency, accountability, financial integrity, sports betting integrity, sustainability, youth development and protection, and the future of sport.

Click to read this week’s article in Portuguese.

Sports Leaders, Gratitude and the Accountability We Still Lack

By João Paulo Almeida
Co-Chair, SIGA Permanent Committee on Sports Betting Integrity

The Portuguese Decree-Law No. 267/95, which establishes the status of volunteer sports leaders, turned 31 on 18 October. The anniversary went unnoticed. The National Sports Development Plan does not envisage reviewing it until the second half of 2027. Until then, sports leaders are left with time off subject to official authorisation, personal accident insurance and little else.

The familiar narrative about sports leaders begins and ends with praise: the sacrifice, the hours stolen from family life, the lack of recognition. It is a comforting narrative, and it is wrong. What sets a sports leader apart is not the time they give. It is the power they hold: they manage public money, bear responsibility for minors and make decisions on behalf of others. Those who hold power should be held to account, not thanked.

The demands will not ease. Nor should they. Safeguarding minors, financial transparency, preventing match-fixing: every new obligation exists because someone failed. A failure of integrity is almost always preceded by a failure of governance. When a faceless investor buys a club, wages go unpaid and matches become fixed, it was not the players who opened the door. It was the leaders.

The mistake lies not in demanding high standards. It lies in expecting one man to do everything. There is a non-negotiable core, whatever the size of the club: accounts, safeguarding minors, conflicts of interest. Everything else should be proportionate to the club’s size and the public funding it receives. But that core requires preparation, and today we require certification from an under-12 coach and nothing from the person managing the club’s money. A minimum level of training during the first year in office, for both president and treasurer, should be a condition of programme funding agreements and public support.

But whom do we hold to these standards? There is a shortage of leaders, certainly. Yet the crisis has two sides: too few people and too few openings. We recruit from the same circles, for roles with no time limit that demand all or nothing. Nobody comes in because nobody leaves, and nobody leaves because nobody comes in. In January, according to the Commission for Citizenship and Gender Equality, women held 0% of presidencies across Portugal’s leading sports bodies, against a European average of 12%. There is no shortage of women in sport. There is a shortage of open doors.

The answer is not another appeal for volunteers. It is to redesign the role: fixed terms of office, planned succession and term limits tailored to the size of the organisation. Those who come in must know when they will leave.

The days of the one-man club are over. A president who doubles as an accountant, lawyer and funding applications manager cannot cope with today’s demands. Accounting, legal support and funding applications can be shared between clubs through associations and local authorities. And public funding must differentiate, giving priority to those that govern themselves well. A system that pays the same to those who comply and those who do not is funding the problem.

The state must also do its part. The Plan envisages certifying clubs and associations, placing further demands on those who lead them, while leaving the status of those leaders for later. First come the demands, then the means to meet them. Both should come together, in a clear exchange. Rights: an allowance of time off work, with reimbursement for employers; management liability insurance; and, in cases involving tax debts, an end to the rule requiring unpaid leaders to prove they were not at fault. Duties: training, declarations of interests, published accounts and term limits.

Gratitude without accountability is what we have had. The results are plain to see.

– THE END –

Previous Front Line articles

ABOUT SIGA

SIGA is the world’s leading organisation for Sport Integrity. We are creating a whole new landscape for the sports industry by delivering independent global rating and certification for world Sport to ensure it is governed and operates under the highest integrity standards: The SIGA Universal Standards.

Funded by our Members, SIGA is a non for profit global independent organisation with one aim: To ensure the sport  industry is governed under the highest integrity standards so that the values of sport are protected.

SIGA is the only organisation to bring together sport, governments, academia, international organisations, sponsors, business, rights holders, NGOs and professional services companies, from every region in the world, around a common cause of fostering greater integrity throughout sport.

SIGA is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, as a non for-profit association, and comprises of the following continental subsidiaries: SIGA AMERICA, SIGA ASIA, SIGA EUROPE and SIGA LATIN AMERICA.

For more information on SIGA, including its vision, mission and reform agenda, please refer to the website: www.siga-sport.com and FAQs.

To contact SIGA, please email: comms@siga-sport.com.

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