23rd January, 2012
The chairman, House Committee on Sports, Godfrey Gaiya, says there is no cause for alarm over the latest court ruling which declared Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, as an illegal body.
He said that the National Assembly is on course to pass the bill that will effect the recognition of the NFF. The Kaduna State-born lawmaker told P.M.Sports that immediately the House of Representatives resumes from recess, the bill that has already passed through the first reading will be urgently attended to in order to solve the latest problem.
“The National Assembly is already working on the bill that will recongnise the NFF. It will pass through second reading when we resume from our recess. Let me assure that we’ll fast track the process of passing the bill. We are concerned about the crisis. We don’t want a situation where there will be confusion because of the name of the football body,” Gaiya said.
He added that: “Other associations changed to federations and nobody complained. We used to have Nigeria Basketball Association, Nigeria Volleyball Association, Nigeria Handball Association and the rest of them which were changed to reflect the name federation in line with international acceptable status, but these federations were not dragged to court. So, the NFA decided to change to NFF, why the noise now?
“If the football body with the name NFF is illegal does it also mean that the government that supports it is illegal? The issue of name should not cause a crisis because it is something that will be corrected soon,” he said.
Members of the House Committee on Sports are expected to reconvene on Wednesday to tackle various crisis rocking the development of sports in Nigeria.
—Francis Achi/Abuja