No Pay-Cut For Keshi –NFF

The Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, has denied reports that Stephen Keshi’s pay will be slashed, but admitted that a cut of his backroom staff is in progress.

Keshi has a contract from which he earns N5million monthly wages, in addition to other allowances, but with the NFF in dire financial straits, the body is implementing cost-cutting measures, and the coach’s wages was reported to be involved.

But a member of the NFF’s Executive Committee, Emeka Inyama has  said that was not the case.

“Keshi has a contract that guarantees his salary so why should there be a slash? That would be a breach of contract on our part,” he told newsmen. “In fact, there is no contemplation of any such thing.”

Inyama did admit that the Federation had resolved to cut down the backroom staff from 17 to a more financially manageable nine.

“We need to keep it down in line with FIFA standards which specify how many officials you can actually have on the bench. So we are bringing it down from 17 to nine.

“We have talked about auditing of staff of the national teams, especially backroom staff, as well as pegging of bonuses and allowances.

“We are constrained to do this as a result of our poor finances and we believe that Nigerians understand we have to do this in order to continue to fulfil our obligation of presenting the national teams for international competitions and tournaments.”

Currently, each player receives $10, 000 for a win and $5,000 for a draw. The head coach and his technical officials get double what the players receive, while other staff get $8,000 and $4,000 for a win and draw respectively.

And for every day of camping, every team member is paid $100 daily allowance. Apart from the camping allowance, the bonuses are expected to be cut by no more than 50 per cent.