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Nigeria
received a reprieve on Friday in its face-off with world football
governing body, FIFA, as the ban placed on the country last Monday was
lifted on Friday after a meeting of the football body’s emergency
committee.

“The FIFA Emergency
Committee decided today, 8 October 2010, to provisionally lift the
suspension of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF). The decision was
taken after observing that the situation had taken a positive turn in
recent days, with the claimant at the origin of the court actions
publicly committing itself to withdrawing its claim, the acting General
Secretary of the NFF returning to his post on 5 October 2010 and the
issue of the Nigeria League being left totally within the ambit of the
NFF,” FIFA said in a statement released after the meeting.

“The suspension has
been lifted provisionally until 26 October 2010, after noting that the
next hearing before the court is scheduled for 25 October 2010 and that
only then can the judge vacate the court orders. However, should the
NFF still be embroiled in court actions or any other issue preventing
it from working freely on that date, the suspension will be
automatically confirmed until all problems have been definitively
solved.”

The decision coming
at the time it did was not surprising. In the 72 hours preceding the
reprieve there had been a flurry of activities geared towards getting
the football body to rescind its decision. A number of prominent sports
personalities including Mary Onyali-Omagbemi, Falilat Ogunkoya, Henry
Amike, and Yusuf Alli had met in Lagos on Tuesday and called on FIFA to
to lift the ban. They also castigated some individuals within the
football family for initiating the ban on Nigeria.

Sacrificing Baribote

That same day,
Rumson Baribote, the chairman of Bayelsa United was fired by the
Bayelsa State Government along with other members of the board. The
action was done without much fanfare and people did not think much of
it. But for those who have followed events keenly, it was a strategic
move.

Baribote was one of
the central figures in the furore over the enlargement of the Nigeria
Premier League to 24 teams. His club had been relegated and he had
threatened to head to the Court of Arbitration in Sports (CAS) in
Switzerland if he did not get justice in Nigeria. Many believe the
enlargement of the league was done to appease him, an action that irked
FIFA, which had been informed by its agents in Nigeria that Ibrahim
Bio, the Minister of Sports, was responsible for the move.

In order to appease
FIFA therefore, Baribote had to go. The reasoning was very simple. If
he is fired as Bayelsa United boss, he will have no basis to head for
CAS. With Baribote out of the way, the next step was to get Harrison
Jalla, the man who had gone to court insisting that elections must be
held first into the state football associations before that of the NFF,
to withdraw the case.

On Wednesday, Amos
Adamu, Rafiu Ladipo, and a few others met with Jalla in Lagos during
which Jalla agreed in principle to withdraw the case from court subject
to the fulfilment of certain conditions, which were not immediately
made public. Jalla said if those conditions were not met before October
25, the day the case comes up for another hearing, he would have no
choice but to continue with the suit. With that agreement, Adamu
contacted his people at FIFA headquarters informing them that the coast
was clear for the lifting of the ban. The following night Bio met with
Jalla to “encourage” him to withdraw the case.

It was thus not
surprising that FIFA went into an “emergency” session on Friday after
which it lifted the ban. Jalla was not immediately available for
comment but Princewill Oviesan, Media Officer of the National
Association of Nigerian Footballers, said that in going into
negotiations, his organisation was motivated by the need to spare
Nigerian football as much pain as possible.

“We were concerned
about the Africa Cup of Nations qualifying match between Nigeria and
Guinea, that was one of the reasons we went into negotiations and we
made our position clear that if by October 25, the agreements reached
have not been implemented then we would have no choice but to continue
with the case in court,” he said.

Not yet over

While October 25 is
two weeks away, the worst may not be over yet. One of the agreements
reached at the meeting between Jalla and Adamu was that bodies like
Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN) and the Nigerian
University Games Association (NUGA), who former President Sani Lulu
removed from the list of delegates eligible to vote during NFF
executive committee elections, should be re-instated. This is in
addition to his main demand that state elections must hold before those
into the executive committee.

It may be easy for concession to be made with regard to the first
demand, but it is not likely that there will be progress on the matter
of state FA elections. The reason, NEXT learnt, is because Adamu, whose
tenure on the FIFA Executive Committee comes to an end in less than a
year’s time, is desperate to ensure that his lackeys appropriate
leadership positions on the NFF board. That way, his re-nomination by
Nigeria for another term on the FIFA executive committee, is assured.