THE TURMOIL which has bedevilled the Irish Amateur Boxing Association for many years is likely to erupt in the courts within the next month as a result of a letter from the solicitors representing the Central Council of the association.

The letter was read at the annual general meeting of the IABA in the National Stadium yesterday. It failed to head off vigorous criticism of the trustees of the association and of the Ringside Club, a social club attached to the IABA and on premises owned by the IABA, but not answerable to it.

These problems have been raised at several IABA meetings in the past, and a number of the trustees have resigned and were not present yesterday. Acrimony continues, however, and the new board of six trustees seems to be split half and half between the old and the new.

Account books going back several years have not been produced for scrutiny, and neither have accounts for the Ringside Club.

Yesterday at a meeting of the Central Council of the IABA, which followed the annual general meeting, a member of the new board of trustees, Tom Fox TD, said that there was no suggestion that there was anything sinister going on. All that was desired by everybody was that accounts should be furnished for examination by the rank and file.

Suspicions had grown because of the refusal by the trustees and by the people running the Ringside Club to furnish accounts. Questions about these accounts should be answered.

The letter which was read at the outset of yesterday's meeting from the IABA solicitors stated that, under the constitution of the trustees dating back to their establishment in 1938, an arbitrator should be appointed to sort out the problem. In the event of failure to agree on an arbitrator a High Court action would be instituted.

Throughout the two meetings continued references were made to the dispersal of funds, the closure of accounts, the payment out of "petty cash" of large sums of money, the closure of this account without the knowledge of the treasurer, Martin Power, and other such allegations which has been emerging for many years without any satisfactory explanation.

At the Central Council meeting which followed the main meeting the president. Nicky White, who was re-elected unopposed, said that as far as the new board of trustees was concerned there was a split involving three members from the old board and the three new members.

This, he said, was causing problems which would have to be ironed out if the association was to prosper.