• Adelabu calls for proper board

To actualise President Bola Tinubu’s comprehensive reform of Nigerian football, former Super Eagles player now Chairman, Advocacy for Nigeria Football Reform Initiative, Harrison Jalla, wants the reforms to be competence-driven. He said ‘the probe into, and recovery of, NFF stolen funds should date back to late 2014–2026.”

Jalla’s call came on Friday, just as the Director General of the National Sports Commission (NSC), Bukola Olopade, hailed the resignation of Nigeria Football Federation, President Ibrahim Gusau and the entire NFF board, describing their decision to step aside as an ‘honourable path’ and a sacrifice made in the interest of Nigerian football.

In a message to The Guardian on Friday, Jalla said: “It is a new dawn for Nigeria football. We have all fought a good fight and kept the faith, but we have not finished the course. The struggle continues until the right thing is done from the word go.

“With the composition of the Normalisation Committee, all federating units of the NFF, the private sector, and other relevant groups must be represented fairly and equally. Nobody can hide under the directive of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to skew things in their own favour or play God in this new dispensation. That era is gone forever,” he said.

Jalla who has been in the forefront of the struggle said: “We do not want to go back to Egypt. The National Sports Commission, under Shehu Dikko and Bukola Olopade, must not falter or be seen to favour any individual or group over another. This reform must be total, competence-driven, and nothing more.

“Very many thanks to the National Sports Commission and to all those who later joined our team in the struggle we started so many years ago. Nigeria football wins at last.

“Anti-graft agencies should extend their probe of the NFF to late 2014 down to 2026 and recover the millions of US dollars, stolen FIFA grants and billions of naira in sponsorship funds within the period under review. The current N12 billion or N17 billion probe is merely scratching the surface. People must go to jail for corruption if we are to have a brand-new NFF,” Jalla stated.

In his contribution, former Green Eagles winger Adegoke Adelabu, now a Sports Scientist, said: “I think a committee should be set up to look into the situation. Not until a proper board is set up to carry out the foosball activities, it is extremely difficult for one to postulate any form of strategy to run our football, because we are living under fraudulent atmosphere in all sectors. That makes it difficult for good ideas to find a place of rest. We are led by incompetent and greedy people,” Adelabu, an ex-IICC Shooting Stars of Ibadan player said.

Meanwhile, Olopade said in Enugu, during a Local Organising Committee meeting for the 2026 National Sports Festival that the decision by the NFF leadership to resign had strengthened his belief that Nigerian sport can still move forward when those in positions of authority are prepared to put the wider interest of the country ahead of personal considerations.

It was Olopade’s first media remark since the dramatic resignation of Gusau and members of his board.

Olopade said: “Because we are all in the football and sporting world trying to see how our country can move forward, I want to salute Mallam Gusau for the honourable path he chose by resigning alongside his entire board.”

He stressed that the development was significant to him personally, particularly because it represented what he described as a huge sacrifice for the country.

“As this is my first media appearance since that incident, it was necessary for me to just put this out today and say that my belief in this country has been greatly energised by Mallam Gusau and his words, and all of those who resigned alongside him.”