The elections into
the board of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) have come and gone
with Aminu Maigari emerging as the 38th boss of the body.
It was a landslide
victory for the former director of finance of the federation who until
his victory at Thursday’s polls had been the acting president of the
football house following the impeachment of Sani Lulu. Maigari grabbed
31 out of the 44 votes from delegates present at the International
Conference Centre in Abuja, well ahead of other aspirants, with his
closest rival former NFF Secretary General, Sani Toro, securing just
five votes.
Nine other
individuals were elected into the board and they will be joined by the
current chairman of the Nigeria Premier League, Davidson Owumi, who
will act as the federation’s 2nd vice president.
Court injunctions
But it wasn’t
smooth sailing for Maigari as the process was dogged by controversy.
Originally scheduled for Saturday, August 21, it was shifted to last
Thursday by the Congress of the federation at the request of the
Minister of Sports, Ibrahim Bio, who requested that he be given time to
apprise President Goodluck Jonathan on developments surrounding the
elections.
Before the decision
was taken, a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos had issued an order
restraining the NFF from going ahead with the elections at the
originally scheduled date of August 21 pending the hearing and
determination of a motion filed by the registered trustees of the
National Association of Nigerian Footballers (NANF) led by Harrison
Jalla.
NANF had filed the
suit against the NFF, alleging that the process of the election had
been perfected without recourse to its members and the court decided
that it would be improper to allow the elections to take place when
there was a pending motion before it seeking to restrain its conduct,
and subsequently ordered all the parties involved with the electoral
process to maintain the status quo pending the determination of the
motion filed by the players’ union.
The order from the High Court sitting in Lagos was not the only one issued on the election as two others,
including one from a court sitting in Ilorin, the Kwara state capital, also called on the NFF to postpone the polls.
Ex-players united
On Tuesday, August
24, two days before the NFF elections, a group of placard carrying
ex-footballers led by former national team captains Segun Odegbami and
Austin Okocha, who were aspiring to get into the NFF, as president and
board member respectively, stormed Abuja clamouring for the
postponement of the elections.
Numbering close to
30, the group, which also had in their midst other prominent ex-players
like former African Player of the Year Victor Ikpeba and 1980 Nations
Cup hero Felix Owolabi, faulted the entire electoral process. They
complained of a situation whereby state football association members
who were elected in 2006 and whose tenures had expired formed part of
the delegates at the election when they had not renewed their mandate.
Rounding off their
protest, they urged the National Sports Commission (NSC) and other
relevant authorities to prevent the elections from taking place.
Protesting to FIFA
Before last
Tuesday’s protest, Odegbami had in June notified football’s world
governing body, FIFA of certain amendments made within the existing
statutes of the NFF.
Before the August
2006 elections, which ushered in Lulu as the NFF president, local
government football councils, state associations and Zonal elections
were all held and winners given four-year mandates. These individuals
then voted and elected members into the Executive Committee of which
Lulu was head.
Odegbami, in his
letter to FIFA, reasoned that it was only logical that elections at the
zones must first be held – following the expiration of their tenures –
in order to constitute a new electorate to conduct new elections into
the next Executive Committee, stressing that “to hold elections without
holding constituency elections means that the delegates that elected
the out-going board would be the same delegates that would elect the
next board”, a process he described as “totally absurd, undemocratic
and unacceptable.” This process of bypassing this step by the NFF began
in August 2009 when it sent a draft of its amended statutes to FIFA
seeking, in line with laid down rules, its comments and approval, which
the world body responded to in November of that year with amendments of
its own to some areas in order for the document to be in line with the
organisation’s requirements.
Part of FIFA’s
letter to the NFF, stated that: “We hope that the previous explanations
are of assistance and allow you to review the NFF Statutes accordingly.
Please give maximum priority to the revision, the approval and
subsequent ratification of the NFF Statutes.
Amendment of the statutes
In December 2009
the NFF convened a meeting of the General Assembly to inform its
members of the suggested amendments by FIFA. However, for the amended
statutes to become operational it would require sending the statutes to
FIFA all over again for confirmation that the amendments have been done
correctly for final approval before being presented again to the
General Assembly for final ratification.
A presentation of
the amended statutes to members of the General Assembly was however not
done before it came into law but not before two major amendments – the
reduction of voting delegates from 101 to 44, and the directive to each
State Football Association to have its elective congress in November or
December succeeding the elective congress of the Federation within the
senior FIFA World Cup year.
The latter
interpolation meant that after electing the Executive Committee of the
NFF, the 37 State FA bosses will thereafter go back to their respective
constituencies to seek a new four-year mandate into their own boards.
Odegbami then went
on to plead with FIFA to advise the NFF to stop the “electoral process
until all the anomalies in the conflicting statutes and processes are
resolved”.
Denials
FIFA however
appeared to have turned a deaf ear on the issue even though it sent
officials to observe the electoral process, which eventually took place
despite a court order calling for the postponement of the polls,
receipt of which was denied by the NFF, as well as the chairman of the
electoral committee Abdulrahman Mustapha.
“I never got an
order telling us not to hold an election,” said Mustapha, shortly after
the polls. “I respect the rule of law and if I got anything like that I
would have stopped the entire process.” Jalla who went to the election
venue to personally serve the court order to the electoral committee’s
boss but he was prevented from doing so by security officials stationed
outside the venue even though he had gone to the venue with a team of
15 policemen and two court bailiffs.
“We had served the
NFF, the sports minister (Ibrahim Bio) and the NPL, but I personally
and the bailiffs had wanted to serve Mustapha in person,” Jalla told
NEXTSports on Thursday.
“But when we got to
the venue it almost degenerated into a scuffle between us and the
security team at the venue.” Back to the courtrooms He will however be
heading back to court on Monday when hearing of the case resumes.
Also considering a petition is Odegbami who pulled out of the race in line with the court injunction ordering its suspension.
“When the court
injunction came I decided not to be lawless, so I stayed away from the
venue in line with the decision of the court that the elections should
not be held,” he said.
Odegbami then
added: “My contributions to Nigerian football will continue in my own
way. I wish I was at the head of the federation but I’m not, so in
whatever way one can, one will continue to support them but I’ll pursue
my petition before FIFA to the very end.” How successful such a path
will be, only time will tell, but the immediate reality is that the
country’s football will be run mostly by ‘freshmen’ as only two members
of the previous Executive Committee were returned – Maigari and Chris
Green, the Rivers State FA boss who defeated Okocha to pick the ticket
from the South-south zone.
Green wasn’t the
only state FA boss to be elected as four others also made it into the
board while not a single former Nigeria international was considered
good enough to earn a place in the board including former national team
skipper and coach Christian Chukwu and Mutiu Adepoju.
“This is ridiculous and unbelievable,” said an enraged Bright Omokaro, a former national team player.
“I just cannot imagine what is happening to our football. Those who know nothing about football are now managing the game.
“We were all happy
when we saw some ex-internationals coming out to contest this election
but look at what they have done again. There is no way our football can
move forward with this set of people we have on board managing the
game,” he added.
Enyimba’s chairman Felix Anyasi and football analyst Deji Tinubu
however earned a place in the board and Nigerians will be hoping their
presence in the board will in some way translate into some measure of
success and development for Nigerian football at all levels, from the
grassroots to the numerous league and cup competitions, right down to
the various national teams.
