8 COMMENTARY
THE NATION, SATURDAY, JULY 2, 2011
Two sickening debates on our football
I
AM not a football player. Therefore, the question of being a good footballer does not arise. The most I have achieved in the spot in my entire life was a goal I once scored from the penalty spot without a goalkeeper between the posts. But in terms of spectatorship, Iam certain that not even Dr. Rauf Ladipo, the enduring President of the Nigerian Football Supporters’ Club, can boast of more skill or commitment than mine. In the good old days when the Nigerian Premier League was the envy of the minders of the now ubiquitous English Premier League, I went to the stadium with my own chair on many occasions, just in case I did not get a space in the stand. Since I don’t have a knowledge of football as deep as the potholes ex-governor Gbenga Daniel left behind as monuments to his eight-year rule in Ogun State, I had thought that I should allow the debates concerning the greater player between two retired Nigerian footballers, Austin Okocha and Nwankwo Kanu, as well as the face-off between Osaze Odemwingie and his coach in the national team, Samson Siasia, to pass without a comment. I had particularly taken that decision because wrangling is not one of my vices. Yet football has proved over the years to be the only activity that offers a silhouette of hope that Nigeria has the potential to be a great nation on account of the talents that abound in it. It is the greatest unifying force for the conglomeration of seemingly incompatible principalities called Nigeria. It is on the strength of this that I feel an obligation to
lend my voice to the otherwise needless debate. Kanu, the lanky forward popularly called Papilo, wormed himself into the consciousness of football lovers across the world as a member of the Nigerian Under-16 national team in Japan in 1993, where he shone like a million stars. Thereafter, he became a cherished asset at one of the world’s most respected football clubs, Ajax Amsterdam in Holland. He later joined other big clubs like Internazionale, Arsenal, West Brom and Portsmouth. He is reputed as one of Africa’s most decorated players, if not the most decorated. He has won laurels in virtually all the clubs he has played football, and at the international level, he was not only in the team that won the FIFA Under-16 World Cup in 1993, he captained the Olympic team that won gold in Atlanta, USA in 1996. The attitude of the football prodigy off the pitch is as remarkable as his work rate on the pitch. That, perhaps, accounted for the massive turnout at the testimonial match organised in his honour at the Teslim Balogun Stadium, Lagos on June 11. It was in appreciation of the commitment with which he had pursued national assignments. Not for him the practice of selecting the match to play for his fatherland like some other footballers do. His humility is infectious. For the 16 years he played in the national team, you could touch his excitement in the nation’s colours in spite of his fame and exploits. Little wonder he emerged the African Footballer of the Year twice in 1996 and 1999. He extended his charitable disposition beyond the sphere of football and founded the Kanu Heart Foundation, with which he hopes to help millions of Nigerian children overcome their heart problems. Austin ‘Jay Jay’ Okocha is no doubt one of the finest flowers of football to have emerged not only from Nigeria but from the African continent. His deft touches and mesmerising
moves on the pitch cannot but hold a spectator spellbound. The story is told of how during the 1993/94 football season at his German club, Eintrancht Frankfurt, his goal was adjudged the best of the season after he displaced four opponents, including the goalkeeper, and dribbled them over and over again before he flashed the ball into the net. If this massive talent is left with only one admirer, that will certainly be me. I followed his game religiously from the day he emerged on the Nigerian soccer scene like a bolt from the blue and dazzled everyone with his dribble skills. He had made his international debut for Nigeria in May 1993 in a match between Nigeria and Cote D’Ivoire decided in Abidjan. There, he scored Nigeria’s only goal in the game Cote D’Ivoire won by two goals to one (2-1). In another world cup qualifier against Algeria in Lagos, Okocha scored a text book free kick to level up Algeria who were a goal up. Nigeria eventually won the game by four goals to one (4-1) and ecstatic football fans at the National Stadium, Surulere carried him shoulder high at the end of the match. Anyone who was intelligent enough to distinguish between his left and right hands would realise what promise he held for football or what promise football held for him. His career blossomed in no time and the world of football waited to be conquered by him. Judging by his skill, everyone thought his emergence as the African Footballer of the Year was a matter of time. Unfortunately, he never won the coveted crown. Was it his fault that he never won the crown Kanu won twice? Maybe and maybe not. But there are people who believe that Okocha’s lackadaisical attitude to national assignments even as the captain of the national team could have unwittingly robbed himself the chance to become the African Footballer of the Year. He selected the matches he featured in during the qualifiers for the 2006 World Cup tournament in Germany, leaving many with the belief that the nation could have quali-
fied for the tournament if Okocha had not laid the bad precedent for players to boycott matches. The nation’s inability to qualify for the mundial robbed Okocha himself the chance to showcase his skill on the world stage like he did in France in 1998 and commanded world attention. Though regarded as the most skilful player of his generation, he failed to win the African Footballer of the Year because the Super Eagles flopped and floundered under his watch as the national team captain. In the words of a Facebook user, ‘’Okocha would have won the award if he was a bit serious with the Super Eagles. How can we forget how Okocha dodged many crucial national assignments on the pretence that he cannot find his way to the Super Eagles hotel in London ahead of a crucial away game to Angola in Luanda? His lackadaisical attitude contributed to Super Eagles non-qualification for Germany 2006 and the team is yet to recover from that set back .’’ While a footballer requires skill to be a good player, he must add attitude to be a great player. To that extent, and in spite of the prevarication of football experts on the matter, Kanu is a greater player than Okocha. Unfortunately, Okocha’s precedent has rubbed off on some of our national team players, including Osaze Odemwingie, who has drawn the ire of Siasia for electing to boycott a friendly match between Nigeria and Kenya in Abuja in March, preferring to feature for his club in the UK. Surprisingly, Siasia’s decision to leave Osaze out of the team until he tenders an unreserved apology for an act that could constitute a bad influence on other players in the team is being condemned in some quarters. Readmitting Osaze into the national team without an unequivocal, open and unreserved apology is a recipe for the kind of disaster the team witnessed under coach Shuabu Amodu. If that happens, I will personally carry a placard and match from Lagos to Abuja , shouting, “Down with Siasia!”
How about chop make I chop ministry? Knucklehead
I
IF you are not in the Federal Capital Territory and you do not have a direct link with the movers and shakers in the political circles around its Three Arms Zone, then you must be missing out big time. If feelers from the National Assembly are anything to go by, some senators may have begun reaping bountifully from their investments in political stocks. These lucky ones, according to reports, are being bombarded daily with loads of money to ensure that some ministerial nominees do not pass through the arduous screening they should, ordinarily, be subjected to. While many of us were busy struggling to eke out a living, sweating it out in the sun to make ends meet; some distinguished senators were being ‘harassed’ with millions of naira by some unknown agents to frustrate the ministerial ambitions of some persons on President Goodluck Jonathan’s list. How lucky can some people be? Now, before this writer is accused of tarnishing the reputation of these lawmakers, let me state clearly that the allegation of money harassment did not come out of a beer parlour gist. In fact, the heat was so intense and tempting that a ranking Senator, Smart Adeyemi, had to cry out to Nigerians to help rescue the lawmakers from the overbearing attitude of the moneybags. Adeyemi, at a special news conference where he specifically spoke on the matter, said: “We have been under intense pressure by lobbyists and hired political mercenaries to stop some nominees by asking them questions to embarrass them and stop them. They have given many of us sleepless nights with offers of millions of naira so as to discredit some nominees.” You see what I mean? Asserting that all the re-nominated ministers had squeaky clean records and had “performed excellently well enough”, Adeyemi vowed that ‘radical’ lawmakers like him would ensure that the availability of money or the absence of it did not play any ignoble role in the screening exercise. And so, he told the selfish Nigerians including multinationals, their agents and those whose business interests are threatened by Jonathan’s transformation agenda “to steer clear of the lawmakers or they will be exposed.” Well, I guess we need to commend the senator from Kogi West Senatorial District and former President of the Nigerian Union of Journalists for his patriotic stance. As we all know, it takes a heart of steel to reject monetary offers in a country where everything has been monetized. And so, I would not be surprised if Adeyemi gets mentioned in the next National Honours list. Even Ima Niboro, the presidential spokesman, couldn’t have put it better. But then, we need to ask him why he stopped short of exposing these persons that have been harassing our hardworking senators with trailer load of money and the specific ministerial nominees that they would love to stop by all means. It would be interesting, too, to know if some lobbyists have offered them money to ensure that some persons get accelerated screening and spared the hassles of answering tough questions.
This is Nigeria you know and hardly can you get free lunch anywhere these days. We really need to know why a serving senator should be at the forefront of clearing ministerial nominees of any allegation of wrongdoing even when they were yet to pass through the necessary ritual of legislative screening! It would be interesting if this whistleblower can come out with figures and reveal names of those who succumbed to the money pressure. But if it eventually turns out that none of the distinguished members touched the foul-smelling millions, then it could only mean one thing: Gone were those days when Mallam Nasir el-Rufai had to cry out that he was bluntly asked to smoothen his way through the screening session by rubbing the wheel to the cabinet with just a token sum of N45 million. Could that be the case? Or is it just a question of a preference for one pressure group over another? I really cannot tell. Whatever the case, it is clear to this writer that governance has been over commercialized in this country. And no one needs a Smart Adeyemi to tell us that. His expose is but an inkling of the rot that governance has become. Because nothing is beyond the scope of monetization, governance has become such a mumbojumbo business where everything goes. Where others are talking about reducing the cost of governance, the bureaucrats in our system are busy fashioning how to increase its cost just to satisfy the bloated egos of some persons. Or how else can one explain reports that some dim-witted fellows in the topmost echelon of the civil service have hatched a perfect plan in which the cost will, inevitably, blow the roof top? That, by the way, is my reading of media report that more ministries may be carved out of the existing ones in order to put a stop to the endless bickering by cabinet members who feel their status as Minister of State is demeaning. So because some fellows can’t stand the tag of junior ministers, we have to ingeniously create ministries for them to live their dreams as Lords of the Manor? How wonderful. I just hope those who have chosen to embark on this macabre dance of creating jobs for the boys understand that we are in a democracy. If they do, then they should be prepared for a backlash of demands from the populace so that this craze to mortgage our collective wealth can go round. What sense does it make to upturn former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s reform that collapsed the ministries into 18 from its bloated 28? From where do they expect to get money to fund the proposed ministries to wit are the ministries of communication technology; rural development; social development and employment; investment and trade; tertiary education; basic education; health; primary health care; railway; science and technology; special duties and inter-governmental affairs? You know what? I could not help bursting into a whimsical laughter after going through the memo which these eggheads planned to table before the President. Already, Nigerians are complaining about the humongous amount being spent on maintaining the legislature; they are moaning that the judiciary appears to
With
Yomi Odunuga E-mail:yomi.odunuga @thenationonlineng.net SMS only: 07028006913
have fallen by the wayside with allegations of corruption trailing the footprints of its leading lights; they are being suffocated by the stench of corruption dogging the executives. Yet, while managing to soak it all in and trudge on, some persons think the arrant nonsense should continue with the creation of some nebulous drainpipes in the guise of federal ministries! That is the wackiest joke of the season. Why not create a Ministry of secondary health care and tertiary health care to complete the jest? However, can we really blame them? Not really. After all, this same Senate wasted no time in granting approval to the President to appoint 20 special advisers whose responsibility, in my little understanding of how things work in Aso Rock, equals that of any person occupying a cabinet position. Maybe that is the Presidency’s way of reducing the cost of governance, who knows? I may not be a good student of Mathematics but I do know that the greatest undoing to Mr. President’s much-touted transformation agenda may as well be this inclination to spoiling the broth with too many cooks. When we had expected a cut in the present crowd of 14 special advisers, Mr. President just got the authority to add more. One of the senators, Odion Ugbesia from Edo Central, was quoted to have said “20 Special Advisers is too small for the president of a country.” Hmnn! We can only pray his agenda does get lost in the web of the intrigues that will, expectedly, follow a cabinet that is made up of diverse interests of 42 ministers and 20 special advisers contesting for relevance! While at it, maybe the powers-that-be should give a strong consideration to the establishment of a new ministry—the Chop make I chop Ministry—that should have, as its mandate, taking care of the suffering masses who, I presume, are the direct victims of the truck loads of money being ferried around to, as it were, make things happen. Fair enough, not a single ministerial nominee had been asked any embarrassing question and the screening has so far been conducted to the point that some lucky few had simply taken a bow. There has been less talk about money, its contents and discontents as senator after senator takes us through the shambolic screening drama. Will someone please remind them that we are not immune to joining the party at the mainstream if only they will pass the cake down here? Let the party begin now!