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Analysis Feature Update

Just What Game Is Pinnick Playing Ahead Of NFF Elections?

Nigeria Football has been the play thing of Amaju Pinnick for the past eight years and he is not about to let go just yet even after sounding it on the roof tops that he will no longer pursue his unpopular third term ambition.

He has gone on national television to say he will “intervene” but not “interfere” as he steps aside.

It appears there is a lot more to this statement than many watchers of Nigeria Football have been led to believe.

What is becoming more obvious is that ‘Scar Face’ will very much want to install a puppet to succeed him and at best scuttle the entire Election process to give him the additional months he has begged for.

The NFF Congress may have got their way for Elections to be conducted next month, which is the terminal date of the Pinnick administration.

But they dropped the ball big time when they allowed Pinnick to single handedly compose both the NFF Electoral Committee and the NFF Election Appeals Committee.

The six geo-political zones were requested to nominate two members for these two committees and by the Electoral Code, these nominees must be bonafide members of the football family.

North Central got it right with their nominee Chive Kaave, who was at a time NFF Vice Chairman, otherwise most of the nominees were not fit and proper.

The communiqué for the General Assembly in Lagos was delayed for several hours because NFF General Secretary Mohammed Sanusi had to go to the Lagos home of Pinnick for them to compose the Electoral Committee and Election Appeals Committee.

The committee members ought to have been left to choose their chairman.

This issue caused a stormy virtual meeting of the NFF Executive Committee with NFF 1st Vice President Seyi Akinwunmi, a lawyer by profession, openly registering his disappointment.

The players union PFAN has also taken exception to the appointment of the Chairman as well as a member of the Electoral Committee on the grounds of conflict of interest.

Electoral Committee Chairman Aikhunegire Anthony Malik is a partner of Pinnick’s personal lawyer, while another member of the same committee, Rumson Ariyo, enjoys close ties with the outgoing NFF President.

PFAN has demanded for their resignation and will petition FIFA, CAF, the Sports Ministry and the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) on this matter.

The role of the original Electoral Committee Chairman for the 2014 Elections, Amoni Biambo, destabilised the entire process when he sided with Chris Giwa group that the Congress was forced to replace him with Samson Ebomhe for Elections to be held in Warri thereafter.

PFAN has also raised another valid point that the participation of “appointed” Anambra FA Chairman Chikelue Iloenyosi, who seconded a motion, could invalidate all that was decided at the General Assembly in Lagos.

The decision to shut out a statutory Congress member, the players union, from the General Assembly in Lagos was also done without adherence to the process laid out in the NFF Statutes for the suspension or expulsion of such a member.

 Should these points be tested in court, the entire process to elect a new leadership for Nigeria Football will collapse as it was built on a faulty foundation.

And then only one person will benefit from the ensuing chaos – Amaju Pinnick.

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