Nigeria Content Online

Last weekend I
enjoyed one of those rare moments when a researched, investigative
article manifests in a true life situation almost immediately.
Suddenly, Amos Adamu seems to have delivered his own head on a plate as
a scapegoat for sacrificial offering. Just last week I had strong
reason to share my thoughts in an article titled False Indication of
Fair Administration (F.I.F.A.). In it I highlighted the way FIFA dealt
with corruption scandals within their organisation in the past and
concluded the world governing body has established a reputation of
glossing over serious issues.

This is
substantiated by the slap-on-the-wrist punishments meted out to
offenders that are more certainly encouraging than punitive. Many
comments have been made locally and internationally with divided
opinions of what to expect from FIFA concerning this matter. Football’s
governing body has made appropriate statements promising investigations
into the fallout of the sting on Adamu by the Sunday Times of London
reporters posing as lobbyists who wanted to bring the World Cup to the
United States.

Sunday Times’ sting operation

Adamu allegedly
demanded £500,000 ($800,000) – in the recording – for four football
pitches but with payment directly made to him, to endorse a US bid.
Something tells me that would be strong a line of defence; that he put
that caveat of direct payment to safeguard the money’s use from
thieving NFF officials and ensure it is used for the required purpose.
Godfather Blatter immediately wrote to the 24 executive members
promising a full investigation and assured England it would not affect
their bid. Amos Adamu is scheduled to face the ethics committee today.
The Oceania Football Confederation is also investigating the reports
concerning Tahiti’s Reynald Temarii who faces a similar allegation.

Even more serious
is Ternarii’s claim that two bidding nations or parties related to the
bidding nations offered him $10m and $12m for his vote. If true, this
would be a scandal of the level of gigantic proportions and heads must
roll to prove FIFA’s credibility.

The way FIFA has
handled the high profile corruption cases in the past does not make me
very optimistic much will come out of this. If it does that would be
fantastic but then it could only be precedent.

Except the powerful
English FA (and press) insists on a scapegoat, nothing punitive will
come out of this and if so, I suspect the Tahitian will be prey, not
Adamu because of many factors. One of which is his much alleged FIFA
approved succession of Issa Hayatou as CAF President over a vital
power-base Blatter cannot afford divided. More so, Adamu delivers
loyally. We wait and see in the hope that justice is done to leave
Nigeria free of a man touted to be at the root of Nigeria’s football
and sports problems.

I earnestly hope
Adamu is the scapegoat; if only to satisfy the yearnings of many
Nigerians. At least, being caught ‘live’ on camera with his hand in the
pot for once, seems to corroborate the many corruption accusations
levelled at him. In the words of popular sports commentator and
reporter, Gordon Farquhar, “It’s FIFA’s turn to face itself and ask
difficult questions about the probity of some of its members, past and
present” and, if I may add, ‘do the right thing….for once’.

Bio’s assertions on Delhi performance

My other observation of aluta lies firmly at the feet of the Sports Minister Bio.

I read with great
interest and admiration Mumini Alao’s article in Complete Sports about
2 weeks ago titled “Bio, it’s time to bow”. I share the same opinion.
Mumini’s article outlined more than enough reasons for the minister to
honourably take his leave but as expected, he hasn’t.

There’s something
extremely magnetic about holding governmental office that either
corrupts the innocent person with good intentions before assuming
office or reveals the person’s true (hitherto unknown) nature. I don’t
know which adequately describes the Minister. However, I do know that
his initial ‘gra-gra’ of uncovering the Eagles hotel debacle prior to
the World Cup has been obliterated by his involvement in the
shenanigans that took Nigeria football backwards until FIFA’s
intervention. To cap it all, I watched him attribute Nigeria’s Delhi
success to proper preparations and his ministry’s involvement. Amazing!
What adequate preparations? How come there was no mention of the
preparations to prevent the triple doping scandals? Or why didn’t he
address the incompetence or negligence of Nigerian doctors that
accompanied the contingent to India? What is his office going to do
about appealing the sorry cases especially as Indian athletes were
found guilty of taking the same banned substances but were exonerated
quickly enough to continue participating in the Games?

Truly, Sports Minister, it’s time to go. You don’t have a detailed
plan for sports development in Nigeria; if you do, please make it
public within seven days so we can all know and work towards
actualising it with you. Our initial expectations of you have been shot
to pieces. Otherwise we know the general plan is ‘aluta continua’ so
that somehow you will thread your way back into high office in the next
political term.

Tottenham wll play their biggest group game at Stadio Giuseppe Meazza tonight, against defending champions, Inter Milan.

Though this is the
first meeting between the two sides, a known face will be in the Inter
Milan dugout – former Liverpool Manager, Rafael Benitez.

Tottenham manager,
Harry Redknapp can even be named the architect of Benitez’s departure
from Anfield. Redknapp had led his side to fourth place on the league
table last season thereby demoting Liverpool from its avowed place in
the ‘Big 4’ for the first time since 2005.

Inter stand third
on the Serie A log, while their opponents moved into fourth place
courtesy of a controversial goal against Fulham on Saturday.

But all that will prove to be academic in tonight’s clash.

Though the spectre
of Jose Mourinho still looms large at the San Siro, Benitez has enjoyed
a good start to life in Italy and has lost only one match, very
narrowly to Roma, a fortnight ago.

And even though,
there have been unconfirmed reports of disaffection among some of his
players over his methods, the Spaniard should be able to bring his
Champions League experience to bear on this match.

Samuel Eto’o will
be the arch-proponent for the Italian champions but they are missing
the guile and steel of Diego Milito and Esteban Cambiasso, in attack
and midfield respectively.

This will be
Tottenham’s toughest test yet, but Harry Redknapp will be without
influential midfielder Rafael van der Vaart, who was dismissed in their
last match against FC Twente.

Arsenal’s manager is giving the nod to Inter to win this match. He said experience should count for the Italians.

“I have to give
Internazionale the nod in their Group A match against Tottenham
Hotspur. However, when they are playing at home Spurs can cause
problems for any team because they play with such high intensity for
the whole 90 minutes.

“Just as I do,
Inter manager Rafa Benitez knows that very well from his time at
Liverpool, so he will be very careful when he approaches the return
fixture at White Hart Lane. I believe that Inter’s experience will make
the difference though.”

Stand-in captain, Tom Huddlestone said it would be a dream come true when he leads his side out at the San Siro today.

“When you are a kid
growing up, you want to be part of games like this. Going to the San
Siro is special and it adds extra spice that Inter are the holders of
the competition.

“When you look
through their team, they won everything possible last season and most
of them were at the World Cup. It will be a massive game for us.
They’ve had a change of manager in the summer but they’ve had a good
start, especially in the Champions League. They are full of
international players who are at the top of their game. It will be a
special game.”

Redknapp will no
doubt opt for a 4-5-1 formation as his team lines up away from home,
and Crouch will be hoping for a starting berth to ruin his former
manager Rafa Benitez’s night.

Possible lineup
Inter: Julio Cesar, Maicon, Lucio, Walter Samuel, Christian Chivu;
Javier Zanetti, Wesley Sneijder, Dejan Stankovic; Joel Chukwumma,
Samuel Eto’o, Coutinho.

Tottenham: Huerlho
Gomes; Alain Hutton, William Gallas, Sébastien Bassong, Benoit
Assou-Ekotto; Aaron Lennon, Tom Huddlestone, Wilson Palacios, Gareth
Bale, Luca Modric, Peter Crouch.

Manchester United and Rooney

While Manchester
United are expected to get all three points against Turkish visitors,
Bursaspor, the real drama is the apparent fallout between Alex Ferguson
and his star striker, Wayne Rooney. Rooney was dropped to the
substitutes’ bench in the galling 2-2 draw at home to West Brom and
another substitute appearance will fan the flame of the England man’s
exit rumours.

Hapoel vs Schalke

Vincent Enyeama
will be hoping to keep a clean sheet for Hapoel tel-Aviv at the Arena
AufSchalke and help his side to their first points in a maiden campaign
as they face Schalke 04. The German side also have to start getting the
points after a less than desired start to the season both domestically
and in Europe.

Rangers vs Valencia

Rangers are yet to
concede a goal and another clean could see them eyeing the next round.
But there is the distraction of a crucial Old Firm game on Sunday
against second-placed Celtic so expect a Valencia squad to get stuck in
to recover the points lost on home soil to Manchester United.

Rangers’ manager,
Walter Smith said: “The Champions League is an unforgiving environment
but the next game is vital for us in terms of European football in the
New Year. If, and it’s a big if, we could manage to beat Valencia at
home, I think that would go a long way to securing some kind of
European football after January.”

Valencia’s play maker, Juan Mata does not see the match as a decider of anything in the group.

“It will be a very important game against Rangers, but I don’t think
it will be decisive because there are still three matches to go after
the one in Glasgow. We have back-to-back games against Rangers and we
will try to win them and put ourselves in a strong position to qualify
from the group.”

FIFA
Executive Committee member, Amos Adamu will today at the headquarters
of the football governing body in the Zurich, Switzerland face the
ethics committee.

Reporters from the
British newspaper, The Sunday Times, posed as lobbyists for a
consortium of private American companies who wanted to help secure the
2018 World Cup for the United States. And they filmed Adamu agreeing to
accept $800,000 in return for his vote in the 2018 FIFA World Cup bid.

He is alleged to
have said the money, which is to be paid to him personally, will be
used to build four artificial football pitches in Nigeria.

Adamu was at FIFA’s
headquarters on Monday to meet with the body’s president Sepp Blatter
who promised an “in-depth investigation” into the allegations.

Besides Adamu, who
remained in Switzerland ahead of today’s meeting with the ethics
committee, there are also three other FIFA officials implicated in the
scandal.

They are
Tahiti-born Reynald Temarii, president of the Oceania Football
Confederation, who is alleged to have asked for a payment to finance a
sports academy in New Zealand; Amadou Diakite from Mali, a member of
FIFA’s Referees’ committee who demanded for $1 million,

and Slim Aloulou,
the Tunisian chairman of FIFA’s disputes resolution committee, who said
they should not pay “peanuts,” suggesting bribing Executive Committee
members with as much as one million pounds each.

Taking all steps possible

FIFA said in a
statement that it “has opened proceedings against two current members
of the FIFA executive committee to ascertain whether they have violated
the FIFA code of ethics, and has asked the chairman of the ethics
committee to act without delay to take all possible steps, including
the possibility of provisional measures, should the relevant conditions
be met.

“Investigations are also ongoing in relation to other FIFA officials who may have been involved in the issue in question.”

The FIFA’s ethics
committee is headed by former Swiss striker Claudio Sulser, and they
will also probe suspicions of collusion between unnamed bidding
nations. A press conference has been scheduled for this evening after
the meeting of the ethics committee.

FIFA on Tuesday
however said it was too early to comment on whether a bidding nation
could ultimately be disqualified for a serious breach of the rules.

With only the 24 executive committee members entitled to vote, the
allegations are a blow to the credibility of the bidding process, which
is due to reach a climax on December 2 when FIFA announces the
respective hosts for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup tournaments.

Plans
are underway to hold an international football exhibition in Nigeria.
The event, which will be the first of its kind in Nigeria, is scheduled
to hold on December 9, 2010 at Sheraton Hotels and Towers in Lagos.

Themed Nigeria International Football Expo 2010, the event is being organised by Fair Play Marketing and Vantgarde Limited.

Speaking at a press
briefing yesterday to herald the event, Justin Ofor, Managing
Director/CEO of Fair play said the expo will involve a business forum,
an exhibition and football carnival with a networking lunch held where
ideas and abilities will meet to fuel and create a vibrant football
market in Nigeria.

“The idea of the
Nigerian International Football Expo is to give government,
stakeholders, administrators, clubs, coaches, players, fans, sponsors
and companies in the football industry or related businesses from all
over the world, an opportunity to come together to talk football, learn
football, network football and do business with football in Nigeria,”
Ofor said.

Ofor, who ventured
into sports business in England, said he and his associates in
Vantgarde want to put the knowledge they acquired there to help develop
the business side of football in Nigeria.

Football without government

Also speaking at
the occasion, Helen Emore, Managing Director/CEO of Vantgarde said the
belief that without government football is dead in Nigeria, erroneous.

“The success of
football does not depend on government. In Nigeria, football can
flourish without government involvement and support. Look at Nollywood
and the music industry how well they are doing; is government investing
in them? Despite the numerous challenges they face, Nollywood is
booming. Why can’t Nigerian football be like that? In Nigeria there is
too much dependence on government to get things going in football.

“The only time
football comes alive in this country is either during the World Cup or
the Nations Cup. Why can’t we build an exciting industry around
football? Elsewhere people millions of people make a living through
football. Why can’t we do the same here?”

The football expo,
expected to attract leading football and business minds within and
outside Nigeria, will have three key components.

* A business forum,
which will open a wide range of dealing opportunities and enable
extension of several organisations into Nigeria’s football market.

*An exhibition,
which will provide business and selling networking opportunity for
organisations to showcase their products and services. Organisers say
it will also present a strategic platform for business negotiations,
sponsorships, rights negotiations and marketing.

* A football carnival where there will be a charity game between an
all-star selected team, which will include ex-footballers against a
selected team from corporate/celebrity Nigeria who have supported
football in Nigeria. The match will be used to create an awareness of
the plight of the less privileged in the society.

At
centre court of the 10th edition of the Governor’s Cup on Tuesday, Boy
Westerhof of the Netherlands had a tough time shaking off his tireless
opponent, Sunday Emmanuel of Nigeria.

In a thrilling
encounter that lasted over two hours, Emmanuel, who won this year’s
edition of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) tennis Open, followed
Westerhof point for point. The game, which was won in two sets was not
easy for Westerhof, a finalist at the last edition of the championship,
as Emmanuel gave him no breathing space.

Westerhof started
the game grabbing the first point but that advantage vanished into thin
air when Emmanuel’s persistance started to pay off. By the time the
first set was in a tie 5-5, Westerhof had started showing signs of
frustration but was later to compose himself and win the set 7-6.

A similar scenario
played out in the second set, Westerhof leading with Emmanuel
relentless in closing the gap between them. The set was however closed
with Westerhof winning 6-4.

Commenting on his loss, Emmanuel shrugged it off as one of those things.

“He is a good
player and I tried so much to at least catch up with him but he was as
determined to win. It would have been great if I won but I did not. All
the same, I congratulate him on his victory”.

Women crash out

The first game of
the women’s category played at the centre court between Gail Brodsky of
the United States of America and Agnes Szatmari of Russia was a
relatively easy one for the American. She defeated her opponent in
straight sets of 6-3, 6-4.

In the matches
decided earlier in the day, all the Nigerian ladies who played, fared
badly with all of them crashing out of the championship.

Ekanem Etim was booted out by Raven Klaasen 6-0, 7-6; Ranjeet
Virali-Murugesan of India defeated Bolaji Olawepo 6-1, 6-1; while Anna
Brazhinikova of Sweden thrashed Ronke Akingbade 6-3, 6-1 victory.

The
stage is set for a successful hosting of the 10th edition of the All
Africa Challenge Trophy (AACT) scheduled to take place in Abuja,
Nigeria beginning November 7, 2010.

The golf
championship, which is the most prestigious amateur ladies’ golf event
on the African continent, comes up at the IBB Golf and Country Club and
will see as many as 17 African countries in attendance, although this
number could likely increase before the championship tees off in
November.

Besides hosts
Nigeria, other countries that have already signified their interest to
take part in the biennial championship, which was first held in Harare,
Zimbabwe back in 1992 with 12 countries in attendance, are Angola,
Botswana, Cote d’Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana and Malawi.

Others are Togo,
Tanzania, Uganda, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Kenya, Senegal, Swaziland, Sierra
Leone and South Africa which has won the previous nine editions of the
championship.

Nigeria won the
hosting rights to stage this year’s AACT at the last edition in Egypt
and efforts have been made to ensure a successful hosting of the
championship which will run for four days.

Making this
declaration in Lagos on Tuesday was the president of the Ladies Golf
Association of Nigeria (LGAN), Ngozi Osuhor, who disclosed efforts made
so far by the LGAN, which is the umbrella body that governs all lady
golfers in Nigeria, to ensure a successful staging of the tourney.

Twenty-three
sponsors and counting Amongst these includes the LGAN’s massive
sponsorship drive that has already secured the signatures of as many as
23 corporate and individual sponsors notable among which are Coca-Cola,
Seven-Up, Guinness, Nigeria Breweries, American Express, as well as the
Nicon Luxury Hotel which will accommodate the visiting teams for the
duration of the AACT.

President of the
Nigerian Senate, David Mark, former defence minister Domkat Bali, along
with the Savannah Hotel, which will be accommodating the Nigerian team,
are also sponsors of the event.

This will mark the
second time that Nigeria will be hosting the AACT following the
successful hosting of the 3rd edition back in 1996 at the Ikoyi Club,
Lagos.

A notable absentee however will be Egypt who withdrew last week
citing security concerns in the aftermath of the Abuja Independence Day
bombing.