Nigeria Loses FIFA Exco Seat

Former Secretary-General of Nigeria Football Association (NFA), Alhaji Sani Toro, says all hopes are not lost with the failure of Nigeria to retain a place on the FIFA Executive Committee.

Tidesports source  reports that Nigeria’s candidate, Alhaji Ibrahim Galadima, on Wednesday lost in the elections held at the CAF 33rd Ordinary General Assembly in Khartoum, Sudan.

Galadima had placed last with five votes in the five-man race to fill two of Africa’s four slots on the FIFA Executive Committee, after the seats became vacant following a four-year tenure.

Algeria’s Mohamed Raouraoua won the race with 39 votes, and he is joined on the committee by Ivorien Jacques Anouma who scored 35 votes and is returning to his seat.

Seychelles’ Suketu Patel secured 12 votes, just as South Africa’s Danny Jordann also lost out after he managed only 10 votes, while former Zambian national captain Kalusha Bwalya had earlier quit the race.

Nigeria’s Amos Adamu who had been on the FIFA seat was not up for re-election after his suspension from all football-related activities by FIFA following corruption allegations.

Toro, while reacting to the election results, said the outcome was not unexpected in view of the manner of events which preceded the elections.

“Those of us who know some of them at FIFA had expected it to go this way. I never even expected Galadima to get five votes, I was thinking of something like two or three votes.

“The situation was made bad by the confusion over whether Adamu would win his appeal, and the delay this brought about in campaigning for Galadima really affected us,’’ he said.

Toro who is a CAF Match Commissioner however refused to blame the Nigeria Football Association (NFA) for the situation that led to Galadima’s loss.

“I don’t think we should blame the NFA. The association had nominated Adamu before his problem with FIFA, and when this came up, it sent Galadima’s name as a replacement.

“There were several instructions here and there later, which created a confusion, and in that situation it was difficult to get Galadima’s campaign on the move,’’ he said.

The former Bauchi State Youths and Sports Commissioner however believes all hopes are not yet lost, saying the important issue now should be how to get the CAF hierarchy to do Nigeria’s bidding.

“There is still hope. We have always supported CAF in all its activities, and CAF President Issa Hayatou is fully aware of this. So, all of them there at CAF need to be told that Nigeria deserves the seat.

“Though CAF’s Article 22 Sub-Section 12 stipulate that if there is a vacancy on its Executive Committee, a replacement should come from the zone whose member is out, but we still needs to convince others that Nigeria deserves it first in view of its contributions,’’ he said.

Toro however urged suspended CAF Executive Committee member Amos Adamu to do a more careful study of his case against the world football governing body at the Court of Arbitration in Sports (CAS).

“We need to do a more careful study of the situation in order to move forward, and Adamu has to do a re-think on his stance.

“He should look again at his case, and if he knows he’s not going to win, he should just allow Galadima to go on to replace him so that Nigeria will not lose the CAF seat also.

“We have already lost one, we should not lose two, and Nigeria as a country is greater than any individual,’’ he said.