Last week, former SASCOC chief executive Tubby Reddy was dismissed from his role, alongside chief financial officer Vinesh Maharaj and Jean Kelly, an executive manager under Reddy.

The charges against the officials ranged widely, with the trio eventually sacked after a long-running investigation, which began last May.

The most serious allegations centered around financial matters in the organisation, as well as claims of sexual harassment against Reddy.

Conclusions reached in the report are fairly eye-opening and damning.

"Given the grossly sexually explicit nature of the 'erotic calendar' sent by Mr Reddy to Mrs Vardhan in March 2011, under cover of an email asking her to identify her 'birthday position', I find that this qualifies as sexual harassment in terms of the employer's policy," the report stated in a section finding Reddy guilty of one of the charges against him.

Further charges also surrounded allegations that Reddy failed to disclose dealings with the marketing agent of Chinese sportswear brand 361°, who supplied South Africa's kit for Rio 2016. He was also charged with a conflict of interest in setting up a Ekhaya, South Africa's traditional village, and a bid exhibition at the Glasgow 2014 Commonwealth Games.

The charges paint a fairly ludicrous situation at the organisation, with it also claimed that a meeting held by SASCOC President Gideon Sam was "illicitly recorded". The recording was then claimed to have been played to Reddy which convinced the official the SASCOC offices and his house had been bugged. This is denied by Sam.

The result was that Reddy was found to have commissioned SS Griffin Risk Management Services for a debugging operation, which was paid for by Volleyball South Africa, an organisation he had served as President of.

Given the nature of the dispute, or dare I say it power struggle, there are unsurprisingly differing accounts as to whether bugs were found.

The report which led to the dismissal of Reddy, Maharaj and Kelly even went as far as stating that "in numerous instances" an SS Griffin report into the bugging fiasco was "obviously authored by Mr Reddy, as he speaks in the first person".

It is hard to be sympathetic to the three officials when you read through the report, particularly given that none of the three turned up to defend themselves against charges put against them. Reddy himself stated he had submitted two medical documents which explained that he was ill and unable to attend.

Without wishing to pass too much judgement, it is extremely interesting how many sporting officials tend to be ill when they are fighting charges. If I were facing charges that I deemed to be false, you would have to drag me away from attending, not drag me out of bed.

Speaking of fighting, the three officials have now gone on the offensive. An open letter by the trio has made a series of allegations against SASCOC officials.

It includes claims of a conflict of interest involving SASCOC vice-president Barry Hendricks, as well as a failure to uphold SASCOC's constitution by not holding an Annual General Meeting in 2017 and a suggestion that Kelly was a victim of racism. 

"For the first time SASCOC have not held its Annual General Meeting 2017 under the leadership of this new board," the letter stated.

"Amongst the many violations of the constitution by the board this is a further example of violation as the constitution clearly states that SASCOC will host an Annual General Meeting as part of good governance.

"This is the same President that denied Ms Kelly on racial grounds to be the Chef de Mission of Team South Africa to the Rio Games 2016 as she is 'from the white race'.

"This decision the President tabled in a full board meeting and not a single board member on the board at that time saw fit to challenge or object to such a racist decision."

SASCOC are yet to respond to these claims, but it is clear that this dispute is unlikely to die down any time soon. Reddy is claimed to have submitted more than 700 pages of documents to the chairperson of the inquiry into allegations of misconduct at SASCOC, which was established by South Africa's Sports Minister Thembelani Nxesi in August.

It will be interesting to see what the inquiry uncovers, with the focus set to surround claims of poor governance, financial mismanagement and non-adherence to the SASCOC constitution.

One thing appears certain though, which is the organisation is unlikely to come out of this smelling of roses.

The disputes and alleged governance issues would clearly have had an impact on athletes. Given that the organisation opted to enforce a stringent selection policy for Rio 2016, which ensured only "world class" athletes could join the team, should the athletes in return have a body that has "world class standards?"

Perhaps some of the money which will have been wasted in having to deal with the body’s inadequacies would have been useful in boosting the standard of these athletes. Maybe, the money would have been helpful in boosting the standard of the men's and women's hockey teams, who were denied the chance to go to Rio 2016 having "only" qualified through the African continental routes?

There are a few questions to answer for some officials too, namely International Olympic Committee members Sam Ramsamy and Anant Singh, who did not respond in time to express an opinion on the dismissals of the three SASCOC employees. South Africa Table Tennis vice-president Hajera Kajee, Korfball South Africa's Les Williams and former Paralympian Natalie du Toit all abstained from the vote.

Given the serious charges outlined and a full report provided, it seems strange that these officials ended up not having a say on the cases.

Their failure to cast a vote ended up meaning that just seven of the 14 members voted in favour of the dismissals, which led to Reddy describing it as a "sham and invalid".

While I will not go as far as Reddy, the vote certainly shows an organisation divided and in a mess.