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New NFF President pledges to close ranks with aggrieved football stakeholders

Published

2 years ago

12:17 pm

New NFF President pledges to close ranks with aggrieved football stakeholders

By Oyediji Oluwaseun Babatunde

The newly elected President of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Alhaji Ibrahim Musa Gusau says he is determined to take football matters out of court.

In an interview this week monitored by NigeriaFootball.ng, he opined that his first preoccupation and task as NFF President is to meet with stakeholders in a bid to in his quest to close ranks and move the sport forward.

“The first task I have ahead of me is to make sure that I bring everybody together. We will sit down at the table to ensure that at least we discuss our differences and see how we can settle ourselves to see how we can move the game of football forward,” said Gusau on Channels Television’s Sports Tonight.

The Chairman of Zamfara Football Association before his election as NFF President noted that the major problem the last board encountered in achieving their goals has to do with lots of court cases.

He said: “First of all, part of the problems we had for the past 8 years that made the last board have a lot of challenges in achieving their goals as far as the development of the game is concerned in the country are internal stakeholder issues. The issues that we have been having with other stakeholders with lots of court cases right from the inception of the board in 2014 till the last minute of the existence of the board for eight years.

“One of the key things that I want to do is to make sure that I try to bring able Stakeholders together to ensure that we sit down at the same table to discuss, agree, and then see how we can work together. That is about the only way we can achieve what we want to achieve for Nigerian football because as long as we allow all those kinds of differences to continue, the plans we have for Nigerian football are going to be very difficult to achieve.”

The NFF President served two terms as Chairman of Chairmen of Nigeria Football (NFF) under the administration of Amaju Melvin Pinnick, before his election last week as Nigeria Football’s supremo.

“It was a great experience. There were ups and downs as well as so many struggles days before the elections. We thank God that of has come and gone. We have started consulting all the aspirants on how we can come together and move the game of football forward. The next thing is for us to get the ball rolling and then see how we can move the game of football forward.

“I am not aware of the exchange of Dollars and votes buying during the elections because I am also a contestant and I don’t know where that information came from. We contested and got the victory, then we move on.” He concluded.

Gusau has served in the organizing committee for the African Nations Championship, is a Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) Safety and Security Officer and is presently a Member of CAF’s organizing committee for youth competitions, viz U17, U20, and U23. He will be in charge of the Nigeria Football Federation for the next four years.