On Tuesday, July 16, the president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Alhaji Ibrahim Gusau, delivered a motivational speech to open the 2024 Annual General Meeting of the Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL). As the headmaster of football in Nigeria, he was the most qualified person to set the ball rolling at the NPFL AGM and draw ceremony in Abuja.
First, the NFF president commended the NPFL board and its sponsors for successfully concluding the 2024 season. He also charged the league organisers to avoid fixtures accumulation by doing everything humanly possible to overcome the bad practice of piling up fixtures in the 2025 season.
The whole house agreed with his position because in the past, clubs like Rivers United and Enyimba, who are regulars in continental football, had enjoyed undue advantage over rival clubs due to fixtures accumulation.
Gusau then delved into the issue of the exodus of Nigerian players to leagues in neighbouring African countries. He said the NPFL should intensify efforts to get more sponsors in order to improve its revenue base. According to him, if the NPFL has enough money in its vault, the clubs would enjoy more financial support from the NPFL.
He reasoned that more money in the league would empower the clubs to pay attractive salaries, which would, in turn, stop players in the league from running away from the NPFL. What Gusau meant is that players are deserting the Nigerian top flight because of poor remuneration.
Almost everything the NFF president said about the recent migration of NPFL players to other leagues was true but somehow he erred when he used the word ‘even’ to contemptuously refer to some of countries that have since left Nigeria far behind in football.
Consciously or not, he expressed shock that Nigerian players are rushing to Sudan, Tanzania and ‘even’ Benin Republic, as he said, to play football. When he mentioned these countries, I asked myself if my president is in touch with the reality about football development in Africa.
With all due respect to Gusau, he is living in the past. Maybe he is thinking that Nigeria is still at the level when players from neighbouring African countries like Ghana, Benin Republic, Togo and Cote d’ Ivoire trooped in to play for Nigerian clubs like Abiola Babes, Leventis United, Ranchers Bees, Iwuanyanwu Nationale, BCC Lions, Julius Berger and most recently Enyimba.
The truth is that the Nigerian league has made some improvement but it is not rated among the best in the continent. Unless we are living in a fool’s paradise, none of us can beat his chest and say that what we have is a professional football league. Like I said, the NPFL has improved a bit in recent times but the league is still far from professional.
I want to restrict myself to the Benin Republic, which the NFF president mentioned more than once in his speech. It is indeed shocking that Mr. President is not aware that players in the Benin Premier League, also called Championnat national du Benin in French, earn more money than most of their counterparts in the NPFL.
In Benin Republic, players are paid sign-on fees and salaries as contained in their contracts. As we say in local parlance, when it comes to their players’ entitlements, there is ‘no go come’. The standard of football in the Benin Premier League may not be very high, but in terms of players’ welfare, it is far better than the NPFL.
It is imperative to repeat here that one of the evils that is driving players away from the NPFL is the blatant refusal of the clubs to keep to contractual agreements. Even when contracts are signed, it is for formality. There is still indiscriminate sacking and movement of players and coaches in the NPFL.
Some of us may ignorantly undermine the league in Benin but Nigerian players are not fools. Even as they are not trained economists, the players know that Nigeria’s currency is one of the weakest in the world. Right now, the Naira, which used to intimidate and harass CFA, Benin Republic’s currency, is on a free fall. CFA is now more valuable than Naira. It has more purchasing power.
Recently, I was opportune to see the contract that a Nigerian player who left the NPFL to play in the Benin Premier League has signed with his new club. I discovered that he is going to earn far more than what he was paid when he played in the NPFL. The most fascinating thing is that the very day he signed the contract, he collected his cheque from the president of the club. Show me one Nigerian club that can pay a player the same day he signs his contract.
As a matter of fact, when Gusau expressed shock that Nigerian players are moving to the Sudanese league, it was easy to decode that he was talking about the recent transfer of Enyimba and Super Eagles goalkeeper, Ojo Olorunleke to Sudanese giants Al-Merrikh. Please, someone should tell my president that henceforth, his goalkeeper is going to be paid in US Dollars. Which club in Nigeria can match this standard?
So, saying that everything should be done for Nigerian players to stay back in the NPFL is not wrong. However, overrating the NPFL and underrating the greatly improved African leagues is totally misleading. By the way, I am tempted to remind Mr. President that the Super Eagles may not qualify for the 2026 World Cup because they lost 1-2 to the Cheetahs of Benin Republic. I appreciate the efforts of the present board of the NPFL but there is still so much to be done to catch up with some of the leagues in Africa.
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