TheCable

Ex-Super Eagles striker, Odion Ighalo, one of the most prolific goalscorers, to have led the team’s attack in recent years, is neither qualified to be described as a garrulous person, nor is he, someone, given to flippancy. He was, however, caught up, recently, in the frenzy of having to school the officials of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) in the art of being professional in the business of managing the welfare of national teams’ players for maximum productivity in terms of laurels-winning.

Before the commencement of the Australia New Zealand 2023, FIFA Women World Cup, there was so much hoopla about the outstanding match bonuses payable to the Super Falcons, the country’s senior women national football team. These are bonuses and allowances accumulated during the qualifying series for the tournament. They are matters that are not peculiar to Nigeria alone. But the difference is how amicably they are resolved in other climes. Such a matter is always based on agreements reached, even before the commencement of the qualifying series of any competition. I learnt, there is also a promise of a bonus for securing the ticket, if they eventually do qualify, in addition to the normal allowances for being in the team’s camp. And, coming to the competition proper, they also dish out a graduated motivational package, tied to the team getting to each of the stages of the competition. These and many other factors serve as motivations for the players, which make them put in their very best, to see to it that the country qualifies.

In countries where people of unimpeachable characters run the show, this, once signed and sealed, becomes a bond – a negotiable instrument if you like. That is why, you rarely hear about such issues regrading things like that in most countries where their officials are not integrity-challenged. But with Nigerian “sports administrators”, like Anezi Okoro’s ‘s famous novel – “One Week, One Trouble”, it is “one competition, one drama” or, “one festival of shame”. Still fresh in our memory is the last Olympic Games – (“Tokyo 2020”). The organisers had arranged for a smartphone to be distributed to each of the athletes who have qualified for the games, courtesy of one of their commercial partners, Samsung. Note; “Athletes”, not national Officials. Every participating nation had collected the items and distributed to their respective athletes, as instructed by the International Olympics Committee (IOC). But, Nigerian officials had a different idea. They believe, it should not be given to any athlete who sustained an injury on the eve of the event, and would not be able to compete, even though they had qualified. It did not matter to them that the injured athletes were already in Tokyo. And “luckily” for the charlatans, there were quite a number of Nigerian athletes who, though, had qualified for the games and were even present in camp, either injured or failed doping test. Mind you, it is not as though, they have an intention of returning those not distributed to the IOC. They were intended to be cornered by the honchos of the Nigerian contingents to the games. Rather than focusing on their primary, and about the only assignment of overseeing the wellbeing of the athletes, with a view to helping Nigeria win as many medals as possible, they got enmeshed in the struggle over what was never meant for them. Meanwhile, many Nigerian athletes were seen, washing their self-procured jerseys, and training kits because their respective Sports’ association, together with the Nigerian Olympic Committee (NOC) lacked the requisite knowledge on how to get the needed sponsors to provide them with kits. Common laundry service to get their jerseys and training kits ready for the next outing was not provided. Until the matter was brought to the attentions of a global audience, these covetous officials refused to back down on their bids to corner those smartphones.

The same covetous attitude manifested again, when FIFA announced that, every registered player for this year’s Women World Cup would get at least, $30,000 (thirty thousand dollars) each for being in the group stage. It also promised another $30,000 if they qualified for the second round, then another for the quarter-finals, and so on and so forth, up to the final. Immediately the news of the FIFA largesse for the players broke, then, I knew there was going to be a problem with the Nigerian contingents. Before the shenanigans, the NFF officials were involved in a verbal tirade with the team’s American coach, Randy Waldrum, who it was gathered, they were owing a backlog of salaries, running into 14 months. The indebtedness to the coach was hinged on a flimsy excuse of “lack of fund”. Meanwhile, FIFA had reportedly disbursed the sum of $960,000 (nine hundred and sixty thousand dollars) to each of the teams that qualified for the 2023 Women’s World Cup, as a grant to prepare for the tournament. So, in whose custody is the money, a reasonable person would want to ask? But this is Naija! In the local parlance, we’d say “Otilo” (it’s gone). The money might have developed wings, and vanished into thin air, as usual. After all, FIFA’s protective policy of non-interference had always prevented them from being held accountable for such funds.

Meanwhile, the American coach had accused the federation of denying the team of the necessary support, needed to prepare the team for the World Cup. Rather than responding, and speaking, to the facts of the matter, they resorted to calling him names in an ill-advised, and ill-thought out press statement, by the Federation’s spokesperson, Demola Olajire.

Back to the crux of this piece. No sooner had the world governing-body (FIFA) announced the appearance package for players in each of the stages of the competition, than the NFF unilaterally cancelled the agreement it had with players regarding their outstanding, qualifying bonuses and allowances. Meanwhile, they were benefits already earned, and were supposed to have been paid from the $960,000 that FIFA had reportedly disbursed to each of the federations of the participating nations. Rather than address the issue by speaking to the facts, the NFF resorted to name-calling the American coach, whose about 14 months’ salary still remained outstanding.

As fate would have it, against all odds, the Falcons played out a goalless draw, against the defending Olympics champions, Canada, in their first group game. They followed that up with a scintillating performance against the co-host, Australia, earning a deserved 3-2 victory. From then, they won over almost, all of their critics, including yours sincerely – to be honest, I never gave them a chance to get more than a draw in all of their group games, perhaps, against the debutant, the Republic of Ireland. But I was gladly proven wrong. They recorded another draw against “The Girls in Green”, as the Irish national team is fondly called by their supporters, in their final group game, which was enough to guarantee them a spot in the round of 16. This feat upped their earnings to $60,000 per player. Matters that we all thought were resolved before they team played their opening game against Canada reared their head again, and this time, with a very high intensity. A report had it that the pre-tournament indebtedness to the players has been repudiated by the NFF. And they insisted, the FIFA’s money for the players must be paid through them. But FIFA stood its ground, reiterating its resolve to pay directly into the players’ individual bank accounts.

It is unfortunate, Nigeria now provides a compass for FIFA’s anti-corruption drive, as it has, going forward, adopted a strategy of paying directly into players’ bank accounts, whatever they are entitled to, instead of paying through the National Federations. This, obviously, is to avoid any “Ngbati Ngbati” (cock and bull story), after the money might have developed wings and flown away. NFF’s negative reactions to the decision by FIFA to pay the money to the beneficiaries directly, speaks volume of, in left no one in doubt about, the suspected not-so-noble intentions of the officials, regarding the money.

The negative publicity got so messy that, it attracted the attention of ex-England international, and an Arsenal legend, Ian Wright, who called on the NFF to pay the players, what was due them. He tweeted, via his verified Twitter handle – @IanWright0: “Pay them!!!!!! @thenff”.

Rather than engage in introspection, the NFF, through one of the most respected senior colleagues on its board, started throwing pediatric tantrums around, issuing a statement to counter FIFA, insisting that the players $30,000 (now $60,000) would/must be paid through the federation who will now transfer same to the respective beneficiaries. That is what the world governing-body has been doing before. Left for me, there is nothing wrong with that, safe for the “accident” and the resultant injury to the money. In the past, it has never gone without the money getting involved in “value-reducing” “accidents” on the way to the beneficiaries’ accounts.

But once they realised that they were not making any headway in their bid to get the money routed through them, they decided to fight back, using the instrument of the outstanding bonuses and allowances which they promised to pay, following the players’ threat to down tool, on the eve of their opening game against Canada. This volte-face move by the NFF, in my opinion, is irrigated by the dearth of integrity among the leaders of the federation.

The global footballers union, FIFPRO then had to intervene in the matter, in solidarity with its members, by calling on the NFF, in a press statement, to pay all the monies owed the players – some dating back to 2021. A number of the gallant Falcons team to the Australia and New Zealand 2023, like Asisat Oshoala, Rasheedat Ajibade, Toni Payne, Uchenna Kanu and Ashleigh Plumptre all posted the FIFPRO statement on their Instagram pages. It was at that juncture, that every Nigerian, including retired and active Super Eagles players like Victor Anichebe, Victor Osimhen, and Odion Ighalo decided to add their voices. In a tweet, Anichebe echoed the sentiment, insisting that the Super Falcons be paid what they are owed; “NFF pay them! They did us all proud! And even if they didn’t. Pay them what they are owed!!!”.

Victor Osimhen, through his handle, Victorosimhen9 also tweeted: “Pay them@thenffofficial”.

Odion Ighalo tweeted a very cryptic, but heavily loaded message; “NFF will never stop these things”.

For the former Watford, and Manchester United striker to have sounded like that, he must have seen more than enough of those less-than-honourable acts from the NFF officials that, he’d resigned to fate, and thrown up his arms in despair, giving up on the possibility of a change of attitude by the officials. Those things, according to Ighalo, must have been so customary among the NFF officials that nobody bothered to talk about, or fight against it again, until this current episode presented an opportunity for players, and stakeholders who are in the know, to ventilate. It must, however, be emphasised that, this is not peculiar to the NFF alone. The habit is characteristic of almost all the Sports associations in Nigeria. If athletes don’t grease their palms, the national team setting would be made uncomfortable for them. Worse still, they deny them an invitation, outright. That explains, in part, why Nigerians born abroad, who later switch international allegiance to represent their country of origin, do not last long in the national teams. The idea of having to offer material (monetary) gratification to somebody before being allowed to serve your country is strange to them, and is inconsistent with their own foreign-acquired understanding of the term patriotism, encapsulated in service to one’s country. So after a few years, they usually do not want to be invited again. Victor Moses, Victor Anichebe are two of the most recent cases.

I, therefore believe, if there are still people left in the Glass House, with a modicum of integrity, and shame, the time is nigh for them to reflect on Ighalo’s tweet, grasp the import, and turn over, a new leaf. The cryptic message (NFF will never stop these things) is pregnant with meanings that do violence to the image of the institution of the NFF. It is such a shame that, the whole world is now of the belief (and rightly so) that the so-called officials are there for reasons that border on self-aggrandisement, rather than selfless desire to serve the fatherland for the development of the game. They jettison their core responsibilities and start chasing estacode, at the detriment of the national interest. Imagine, our officials did not deem it necessary to appeal the three-match suspension, slammed on Deborah Abiodun following her red card against Canada, while a similar, but more serious and disgraceful offence by England’s Lauren James against our own Michelle Allozie, attracted only a two-match suspension. Why? Probably, because the English FA were “on duty”, awake to their responsibilities, and therefore, had appealed the three-match ban with which she would have been slammed. But, in our own case, the officials were fixated on the $60,000 (sixty thousand dollars) that FIFA is about to pay our girls. What a shame!

It was this same NFF whose technical department incurred a three-point deduction penalty for the Super Eagles. Why? They failed to keep record of the number of bookings Super Eagles players had accumulated during the qualifying series for Russia 2018 world Cup. That led to the then coach, Gernot Rhor, featuring against Algeria, a suspended player, Abdullahi Shehu, who had become ineligible for having bagged the maximum number of yellow cards in the previous matches. Am I surprised? The answer is “NO”. This is because, the whole place is littered with charlatans, albeit, with the right political connections. Once they are lucky to get on board, there is little or no desire for them to embark on any form of self-development, or capacity-building for effective and efficient discharge of their responsibilities of coming up with ideas that will take the game to the next level of development. All they have to do is, order online, a fine replica jersey of a European football club, and they become a full-fledged football administrators. That is why an elementary task of attracting sponsorship for the development of the game looks like “brain surgery” to them. In the various national teams, Nigeria has some of the most marketable Sports brands in the world, yet, no solid sponsorship deal for any of them. Not even the nine-time African Women Cup of Nations (AWCON) champions – the Super Falcons, or three-time African Cup of Nations (AFCON) champions and one of the most successful national teams in Africa – the Super Eagles; not even the record, five-time winners of the FIFA cadet (Under-17) World Cup – the Golden Eaglets. The story is the same in other sports. “No market”, no show!

The latest in their catalogue of display of bumbling arrogance, irrigated by a wide knowledge gap and lack of tact, is the news making the round that quoted one of the NFF officials as saying, “Osimhen had crossed the red line, and will therefore, be blacklisted from the national team”, for speaking up, in solidarity with our amazons, the Super Falcons. Well, I don’t think it (blacklisting him) is beyond them, if they could do it to Desire Oparanozie when she was in a form of her career, for voicing out, against the criminal denial of her teammates, of their legitimate bonuses. After all, they, to a man whose only tool is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail. They once threatened the likes of Sunday Oliseh and others, in 2002, and made good the threat. We then went to the “Korea, Japan 2002” World Cup, without most of our superstars, and it turned out to be one of our poorest World Cup outing. But I do not think it would be wise for them to push their lucks far. Currently, Osimhen is among the top five most sought after footballers in the world, not on account of not crossing any useless red line, but on account of his proficiency in the business of net-shaking (goal-scoring). He is, therefore, our main hope in next year’s AFCON, if we have any ambition of winning it – something we last did, ten years ago. Should they use their greed and lack of tact to make the young man turn his back against honouring the national team invitation, I hope the estacode-blinded officials will have the nerve to face the over two hundred million soccer-crazy Nigerians to explain their folly, and what end justifies which means.

Post Script:

Please, remember the world record holder in women 100 meters hurdle, Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan in your prayers, as she awaits the verdict of the Athletic Integrity Unit (AIU), over her provisional suspension for missing doping test, three times within 365 days. She is billed to defend, in Budapest this week, the world record she set in Oregon last year, starting from this Saturday, 19th of August 2023.

Abubakar writes from Ilorin, Kwara state. He can be reached via 08051388285 or [email protected]