Nigerian football’s long-drawn leadership crisis, which began after the World Cup in Brazil, where Nigeria reached the knock-out stage, has ended with the emergence of a new executive committee of a the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF).
Last Tuesday’s election was not without its intrigues, after electoral committee chairman, Samson Ebomhe, was arrested and later released by men believed to be from the State Security Service (SSS).
At the end of voting, Delta State Football Association (DFA) Chairman, Amaju Pinnick, was announced the new president.
Pinnick won 32 out of the 44 votes available after a re-run to beat Lobi Stars FC chief, Dominic Iorfa, who got eight votes and Osun State Football Association Chairman, Taiwo Ogunjobi, who had four.
The first round of the polls saw Pinnick garnering 25 votes against Ogunjobi’s nine and Iorfa’s four.
A re-run was necessary because Pinnick did not have two-third of the votes cast the first time.
The NFF election has been mired in crisis recently after FIFA stopped the election of Chris Giwa as the president of the federation by a faction.
FIFA brought sanity back after threatening twice to slam a ban on Nigerian football, if a proper election was not conducted.
There was a lot of politicking after FIFA reinstated sacked NFF President, Aminu Maigari, and ordered him to midwife fresh elections which has now come and gone.
However, before the election, happenings showed that Ogunjobi, who was a former chairman of the NFF Technical Committee, was enjoying a lot of goodwill among the 37 state football association chairmen who were delegates.
He was the most experienced and most exposed candidate vying for the position.
But one key hurdle that Ogunjobi found difficult to scale was that he hails from the same South West region as the Director General of the National Sports Commission (NSC), Gbenga Elegbeleye. This, TheNiche gathered, actually worked against Ogunjobi whom many believed was the best candidate for the presidency.
And while that key hurdle affected the chances of Ogunjobi, Pinnick was strongly backed by the Sports Ministry.
Since the government backing of Giwa failed, authorities in Abuja backed off and asked candidates to find a way of lobbying the NFF delegates to vote for them, while promising to support whoever emerges as winner.
Seyi Akinwunmi from Lagos State scored 30 votes to emerge the first Vice President of the NFF, while Emeka Inyama scored four votes, Adamu Shehu got eight, and Suleiman Muazu managed a paltry two votes.
Musa Ibrahim from Zamfara State was returned unopposed as chairman of chairmen of the state football associations.
Christopher Tam-Abinye scored 26 votes to emerge as member of the executive committee representing the South South zone. He beat Oswald Atuake of Cross Rivers who scored 14 votes.
Sunday Ajayi was elected as member of the NFF executive committee representing South West zone, while Kachalla Kalli from Borno and Modibbo Hussaini emerged winners to represent the NorthEast zone. Felix Anyansi-Agwu from Abia represents SouthEast.
Having thus succeeded Aminu Maigari, who stepped down after a lingering leadership tussle, Pinnick’s immediate task is to decide on the future of the senior national team coach, Stephen Keshi, who does not have a contract – though he led the Super Eagles to two 2015 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers in September.
Pinnick is also expected to – during his four-year term – improve the finances of the often cash-strapped NFF.
In his acceptance speech after the election, he promised that the new executive committee would run a collective football administration.
“We are going to be taking collective football decisions; we will redefine and reposition Nigerian football. It is a task that my predecessor won almost every laurel, but we will improve on that. With this team, we are going to reposition Nigerian football and take it to the next level,” he said.