Nigerian football stakeholders remain divided over calls to suspend the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) elections, as former internationals cite the country’s recent setbacks as evidence of the need for urgent reform of the game’s administration.
Former Dream Team player Abiodun Obafemi, a member of Nigeria’s gold medal-winning squad at the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, expressed concern over the decline in the country’s football fortunes.
Obafemi said the contrast between the team spirit that characterised Nigeria’s Olympic triumph and the current state of the game was troubling, following the recent setbacks suffered by the Super Falcons and Flying Eagles.
“We were celebrating the anniversary of our Olympic triumph just a few days ago, and now we find ourselves facing a World Cup miss for the first time, with the Falcons and the young Flying Eagles both missing out,” he said.
“In our days, we came into camp with hunger, and our relationship with the administration and our coaches was open and sincere. Today, it appears to be a different story entirely.”
His comments followed the Super Falcons’ quarter-final elimination by Cameroon at the 2026 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON) on Sunday.
The defeat ended Nigeria’s hopes of securing automatic qualification for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup, while the Flying Eagles’ 4-1 loss to Burkina Faso in the final of the WAFU Zone B Under-20 Championship ended their hopes of qualifying for the 2027 Africa Under-20 Cup of Nations and, consequently, the 2027 FIFA Under-20 World Cup in Azerbaijan.
The latest setbacks have renewed calls by former Super Eagles captain Segun Odegbami for a temporary suspension of the NFF’s 2026 Executive Committee elections, scheduled for September 27 in Lafia, Nasarawa State.
Odegbami has criticised the country’s football administration, arguing that it has failed to harness Nigeria’s abundant football talent. He described the NFF electoral process as a “four-yearly ritual of crisis” and appealed to President Bola Tinubu and other stakeholders to halt the process.
Chief Executive Officer of Monimichelle Sports Facility, Ebi Egbe, has backed the call, questioning whether the current electoral structure provides a level playing field for candidates seeking change.
Under the existing arrangement, 37 of the 44 Congress delegates are state Football Association chairmen, a structure Egbe said could give incumbents considerable influence over the outcome.
“It will be very difficult for genuine reformers to even consider buying nomination forms for the current NFF elections when the electoral structure appears to give the 37 State Football Association members such enormous influence over the outcome,” Egbe said.
“For me, the real issue is not about who buys a form or who eventually wins. It is about whether the process gives every credible candidate a genuine and equal opportunity to compete.”
However, not all stakeholders support suspending the elections.
Ahmed Shuaibu Gara-Gombe, founder and Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Athletics and Other Sports Development Commission, rejected Odegbami’s position, saying he disagreed with several of the former international’s arguments.
“I disagree with many things he said in that video,” Gara-Gombe said.
He also questioned Odegbami’s record on issues of accountability in Nigerian sports, citing controversies surrounding the Shell Cup and the Nigeria Academicals Sports Committee, which he said Odegbami had chaired.
Gara-Gombe further disputed Odegbami’s previous claims about the fairness of the NFF electoral process, arguing that his past bid for an NFF position had failed because he did not secure the required endorsement from Football Associations in his South-West zone.
Despite opposing a suspension of the election, Gara-Gombe agreed that the NFF’s electoral system required reform.
He said such reforms should be pursued through the National Assembly rather than the courts, arguing that the composition of the Nigerian Football Association Congress was a matter requiring legislative intervention.
“We need electoral reforms, not only in Nigerian football. Electoral reform is required in everything that we do,” he said.
“The issue of the composition of Nigerian Football Association Congress has to do with the National Assembly. Let the National Assembly go there and take up that challenge.”
Gara-Gombe also called on the National Sports Commission to clarify its position on the controversy.
“The National Sports Commission must come out and state their position,” he said, adding that its silence could be interpreted as support for the current process.
The debate comes at a difficult time for Nigerian football, with the Super Eagles having already failed to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the country now facing further setbacks at both senior and youth levels.
With the NFF Elective Congress scheduled for September in Lafia, pressure for changes to the federation’s electoral structure is expected to intensify as stakeholders debate whether the priority should be to proceed with the elections or reform the system before a new leadership is elected.
