By: Eugene Upah
I support President Tinubu’s directive for a comprehensive reform of Nigerian football. It is long overdue.
For too long, Nigeria has failed to qualify consistently for major regional and global tournaments. The reason is clear: deep structural weaknesses in governance, administration, stakeholder representation, development pathways, domestic competitions and accountability.
While other sports have made meaningful progress since the reset of the sports sector under the re-established National Sports Commission, football has continued to lag behind.
The first fallout of this bold directive came yesterday with the resignations of NFF President, Ibrahim Gusau and 8 Board members of the National Sports Commission.
More resignations are expected in the coming days. The National Council on Sports must also be touched to align with this new direction.
Football has suffered for too long. The next NFF President must be chosen from outside the traditional stakeholder cycle. It shouldn’t be business as usual.
On merit and experience, Segun Odegbami and Mikel Obi stand out as the best candidates to lead the NFF currently. If Senator Orji Uzor Kalu were not in partisan politics, his passion for football would have made him an excellent choice.
Meanwhile, Solomon Ogba, Amaju Pinnick and his Assistant, Shehu Dikko are said to be pushing for a comeback. They must not be allowed anywhere near the Glass House again.
Under Amaju’s presidency, Nigerian football administration was ridiculed. Salaries were owed to players, coaches and management staff.
On several occasions, former President Muhammadu Buhari had to personally intervene to fund the teams during overseas competitions.
Even now, Amaju is pushing for control of sponsorship funds and FIFA’s proposed regional bloc funding through PPP partnerships.
This is a defining window to get it right. Even if the President must directly intervene to ensure proper leadership, he should. The Federation has suffered for too long. This is our opportunity to correct an age-long anomaly and rebuild Nigerian football.
