Today, I have to blow my trumpet before it becomes rusty. Last week, my opinion published here didn’t go down well with some sycophants who believe that speaking truth to power is sacrilegious. I had written on the failure of the new board of the Nigeria Football Federation(NFF), to hold its inaugural meeting one week after its election.
Immediately, some NFF apologists bared their fangs trying to devour me. One of them wrote “This opinion is just an exercise in political titillation, rable rousing and scaremongering. Only one week since an election and this ‘concerned stakeholder’ is already crying wolf…
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Despite the futile attempts to set me on collision course with the new NFF leadership, some people saw sense in what I had written and commended my courage, professionalism and patriotic endeavour. Such words of commendation no doubt healed the psychological wounds my ‘opponents’ had attempted to inflict on me.
However, a few days later, I was completely vindicated when the board indeed woke up from its slumber as I had demanded and held its inaugural meeting on Tuesday, October 11, at its Secretariat in Abuja, where ‘far reaching’ decisions were taken. So, like the brave and ingenious agama lizard that nodded its head in self admiration after jumping down from the tree top without any injury, I also have every reason to praise myself. It can’t be denied that my harmless and well intended write-up jolted the board to life.
Well, at the end of the inaugural meeting, the new NFF board resolved that the calendar of each and every of the leagues operated within Nigeria must be approved by the NFF before commencement. The board also ruled that the Federation Cup will now run alongside the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL), with the seriousness of organization and attention that it deserves. We are all living witnesses to how the oldest and most prestigious club competition in Nigeria became a shadow of its old self under the infamous Amaju Pinnick led board.
As commendable as this critical decision by the board is, it failed to give a clear indication of when the new season will commence. It is disturbing that nearly three months after the end of the 2022 NPFL season, the participating clubs are left guessing when they will be called upon to start the 2022/2023 Season.
It will also be recalled that in September, the Federal Ministry of Youths and Sports Development declared the League Management Company (LMC), operators of the NPFL, illegal and ordered that its licence be withdrawn by the NFF. The ministry went a step further to set up an Interim Management Committee (IMC) for the league to be chaired by a former Director General of the National Sports Commission (NSC), Hon. Gbenga Elegbeleye.
Of course, considering the crooked manner in which the LMC was set up, the decision of the sports ministry didn’t come to many as a surprise. No one believed the sham called LMC would last this long. However, it did and when scraped eventually, beneficiaries of the dubious organization cried foul as they claimed that the ministry had usurped the power of the NFF.
The scrapping of the LMC is still a contentious issue. Therefore, going by the failure of the new NFF board to make a categorical statement on the fate of the LMC and the deafening silence on the side of the newly constituted IMC, it will take the special grace of God for the 2023 NPFL season to commence this year.
As a matter of fact, the board only mandated its legal unit to liaise with the General Secretary on how best to reconstitute boards of the other leagues like the Nigeria National League (NNL), Nigeria Women Football League (NWFL) and the Nationwide League One (NLO) which were dissolved alongside the immediate past NFF Executive Committee. This means the other leagues too will be in coma for a while.
This is indeed a disturbing scenario. It underscores the fact that after so many years, Nigerian football league still can’t boast of a stable calendar. It is also shameful that since 1990, those in charge of Nigerian football have failed to harmonise our league with the developed leagues of the world.
With less than three months to the end of the year, we are still discussing reconstruction of league boards when leagues in other countries are approaching the half way mark. This means, nothing can stop the 2023 football season in Nigeria from being rushed.
Unfortunately, anything rushed or done in a hurry is usually bereft of proper organisation which inevitably leads to poor results. Year in, year out, we start late, finish late or rush to produce half-baked representatives in the continent. It is too early to forget how the NFF hurriedly picked Kwara Unitee to represent Nigeria in the ongoing Confederation Cup simply because there was no time to conclude the 2022 Federation Cup.
It is indeed painful to see Nigerian clubs engaging in pre-season matches even now that their counterparts in other countries are busy playing league matches. Those who are supposed to put things in place for our domestic league to commence are busy groping in the dark.
Well, we are the world’s acclaimed masters of fire-bridge approach. Even if the league commences in mid 2023, we would still produce league winners who will go on to fumble and wobble out of continental competitions. Then being people who are recalcitrant, we would again indulge in other leagues like the Premier League, Bundesliga, LaLiga, Ligue 1 and Serie A as well as other trivialities without giving a hoot about when our league will commence. This is the bitter truth about the Nigerian league and its administration.
