By Victor Okoye
Abuja, Aug. 15, 2023 (NAN) The House of Representatives Committee on Sports has charged Ibrahim Gusau, President of Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to be more efficient and transparent in the running of the football house.
Speaking during a meeting with the leadership of NFF at the National Assembly on Tuesday, Chairman of the Committee, Ekene Adams said there was a need for the NFF to put its house in order to attract more sponsors and move the country’s football forward.
The chairman and his members largely absolved the present NFF board of blame over maladmistration and mismanagement of funds , adding that it was all part of the past administration.
Series of questions over the state of Nigeria Football, particularly the none payment of the Super Falcons entitlements and the other Nationals teams allowances and bonuses were also asked by the committee.
The committe also read out some petitions that were written against the NFF by some aggrieved stakeholders and sought to have answers to the petitions.
Gusau did manage to provide some explanations to why the National team players are been owed allowances and bonuses.
He attributed the outright failure of the football house to pay their coaches and players to its inability to secure a standing sponsor.
He explained that NFF’s major sponsor AITEO had some issues and as a result could not meet up with its financial commitment to the NFF.
He however assured that the Federation had employed the services of a legal team who are working hard towards addressing and resolving the issues between both parties.
“I want to assure Nigerians that very soon they will see a lot of changes in the development of football so that a lot of sponsors will come back to us.
“All these issues of non-payment of match bonuses and so on is due to the lack of sponsors. By the grace of God, everything will be resolved.”
Speaking specifically on the Super Falcons payment, Gusau assured that the players would receive their entitlements as soon as the NFF receives the world cup money from FIFA.
He also said the fate of Randy Waldrum on whether or not he remains as the Super Falcons coach would soon be decided soon by NFF’s Technical Committee.
“By reason of their round of 16 feat at the FIFA women world cup, the players will earn 60,000 dollars about ( N 45.6million naira)each.
“I want to assure that the players and officials will be paid all their entitlements as soon as we receive the world cup money from FIFA.
“For coach Waldrum, as you all know, the NFF standing and adhoc committees were just recently constituted and as soon as they are inaugurated, the technical committee will sit and decide the future of the coach,” he said.
Gusua thanked the House committee chairman and members for the invitation and assured that all issues discussed would be addressed and resolved by all stakeholders involved in order for peace to reign in the football house.
“In all other areas we have agreed to work together because there is no way we can succeed as a federation without working with the committee.
“We are about to embark on a trip for a national assignment and have agreed to fix a date for all other relevant issues to be harmonised and resolved as soon as we return.
“This is the beginning of better things to come and you are going to see more of this as it has to be a continuous process.
“We have already started to understand ourselves and how we can work together to move the country’s football forward and I can assure you that very soon Nigerians will begin to see alot of changes,” he said.
Meanwhile, the House Committee members ordered the NFF to reverse their decision on the setting up of a normalisation committee in Plateau and Nasarawa state.
The Committee also charged the NFF to resolve the issues regarding the two affected State Football Associations (Plateau and Nasarawa) where Normalisation Committees were set up.
“What we are simply saying following petitions received from the two State FAs is that the Federation should respect and go back to their statute to restore peace and order in Nigeria football,” he said.
NAN reports that the committee and the NFF both agreed to organise a larger meeting soon so as to include all relevant stakeholders. (NAN)
