By Paul Lucky Okoku
AUTHOR’S NOTE: This article is part of my continuing investigative examination of nearly six decades of Nigerian football leadership. It asks whether former footballers, who have rarely been entrusted with leadership at the top of the NFF, including its presidency, are being judged by the same standards applied to the non-footballers who have historically administered the federation.
NEARLY SIX DECADES GIVE US A RECORD TO EXAMINE
From the 1970s to 2026, Nigerian football has largely been led by military officers, government appointees, businessmen, bureaucrats and career administrators. Former internationals have served on boards and technical structures, but not with sustained control of the federation’s presidency.
Nigeria became African champions, reached World Cups and won Olympic gold.
But success does not cancel accountability.
Across generations, familiar problems have returned: unstable technical direction, poor preparation, questionable appointments, unpaid obligations, weak development pathways, financial controversies and failures of accountability.
This is bigger than bonuses. It is leadership.
COACHING INSTABILITY IS A LEADERSHIP DECISION
Consider the road to the 2026 World Cup.
José Peseiro began the campaign. Finidi George succeeded him in April 2024 but lasted only weeks. In August, the NFF announced Bruno Labbadia, only for the appointment to collapse within days over unresolved tax terms. Augustine Eguavoen stepped in temporarily before Éric Chelle was appointed in January 2025.
No single coaching change can be blamed for Nigeria missing the World Cup.
But repeated changes, collapsed appointments and uncertainty over technical leadership are governance decisions.
Why are such choices repeatedly made in crisis rather than through long-term planning?
INDIGENOUS COACHES DESERVE THE SAME PROFESSIONAL STANDARD
Nigeria must also ask whether indigenous coaches receive the same institutional respect as expatriates.
A Nigerian coach deserves no special favour. If he fails, hold him accountable.
But the Super Eagles job should carry clear standards regardless of nationality: proper contracts, competitive compensation, technical authority, appropriate support and transparent expectations.
If an expatriate can be paid in dollars, a Nigerian in the same position should not automatically be treated differently.
Nigerian coaches are not allergic to dollars.
A head coach should also have meaningful authority to choose assistants and players. Administrators should not impose assistants, interfere with selections or introduce academy interests into technical decisions, then hold the coach solely responsible.
Stephen Keshi, who led Nigeria to the 2013 AFCON title, described contractual terms offered by the NFF in 2015 as a “slave contract.”
That deserves separate examination.
The principle is simpler: The standards of the Super Eagles head-coach position should be determined by the office—not by the passport of the person occupying it.
Therefore, core contractual benefits, professional support and agreed currency of compensation should apply consistently, regardless of whether the coach is Nigerian or expatriate.
WHO CHOOSES THE LEADERS MATTERS TOO
Leadership does not begin after an election.
Under the previous NFF Congress structure, the 36 State Football Associations and the FCT controlled 37 of 44 votes — 84.1 percent of the electorate.
The March 2026 reforms expanded the electorate to 54 votes, reducing the State FA/FCT share to 68.5 percent.
That was progress.
But State FAs and the FCT still hold 37 votes, compared with 17 for every other constituency combined.
State FAs are essential to football development.
The question is whether any single constituency should possess more than two-thirds of the electoral power used to select Nigerian football leadership.
That too is a governance question.
A NATIONAL TEAM CANNOT ABANDON THE SYSTEM BENEATH IT
On April 19, 2022, former Nigeria captain and coach Christian Chukwu criticised the neglect of home-based players and called for stronger NPFL pathways into the Super Eagles.
Stephen Keshi had confronted the same issue years earlier.
On December 19, 2011, Keshi said home-based players would form the “bedrock”of his rebuilding programme.
He acted on it.
Six home-based players were part of Nigeria’s 2013 AFCON squad, with Godfrey Oboabona becoming an important defender and Sunday Mba scoring the winning goal in the final.
Yet on August 23, 2013, reports said the NFF Technical Committee rejected a 42-player camp list containing 24 home-based players and required Keshi to reduce it.
Local players should never receive automatic national-team selection.
They must earn it.
But they must first be given a credible opportunity to compete.
If Nigeria continually looks abroad for virtually every senior international while its domestic league struggles to produce visible pathways, leadership must examine the development structure it has built.
ACCOUNTABILITY MUST COVER THE WHOLE SYSTEM
Fanny Amun’s 2026 fact-finding exercise examined administrative, technical, financial, organisational and developmental problems affecting Nigerian football.
He later spoke publicly about allegations involving unequal payments and interference in technical decisions.
Why are investigators in 2026 still examining problems recognizable across generations?
Accountability also goes beyond welfare.
In 2009, $236,000 was reported missing from a safe at the football federation’s secretariat, resulting in investigation and legal proceedings.
The issue today is not assigning guilt retrospectively.
The leadership question is: what controls protect football’s money, and what accountability follows when those controls fail?
APPLY THE SAME STANDARD TO EVERYONE
Former footballers often acknowledge:
Because we played football does not automatically mean we can lead football.
Correct.
But being a lawyer, businessman, politician, accountant, journalist, civil servant or career administrator does not automatically make someone a good football leader either.
Leadership must be measured by competence, integrity, preparation, vision, accountability and results.
So apply the same standard to everyone.
How can an entire group be declared incapable of succeeding when it has never been given a meaningful opportunity to build a leadership record at the very top of the NFF, including its presidency?
Nigeria has produced generations of former footballers with university education, advanced degrees, business experience, coaching credentials and leadership experience inside and outside sport.
Some would fail. Some would succeed.
That is true of every profession.
You cannot fairly hold footballers accountable for a leadership failure they have never collectively been given the opportunity to produce.
Set transparent standards. Allow qualified people to compete. Then judge the individual.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s football reform directive creates an opportunity to examine nearly six decades of history—not to claim footballers automatically have the answers, but to learn from the record.
The question should no longer simply be:
Can footballers lead?
It should also be:
Have we applied the same leadership standard to those who have actually been given the opportunity?
And after nearly six decades of different administrators and familiar problems:
What does the record tell us we must finally do differently?
As Nigerian football enters another period of restructuring, qualified former footballers should be given a meaningful opportunity to contribute to that answer.
They understand competitive sport from the inside. They understand many of the pressures, sacrifices and vulnerabilities experienced by those who compete.
That perspective matters.
But representation must also come with responsibility: footballers must organise, speak collectively and help build structures that protect the rights, welfare and dignity of current and future players.
Because one principle should never be negotiable:
No sporting structure should prosper while the athletes producing the value are left financially weakened or exploited.
In familiar Nigerian Pidgin:
“Monkey dey work, baboon dey chop.”
The expression describes a situation in which one person does the hard work while another enjoys the benefits.
Too often, that has reflected an uncomfortable reality in Nigerian football: players, coaches and other professionals connected to clubs and national teams produce the sporting value, yet some have repeatedly had to struggle for salaries, bonuses, contractual obligations and basic professional treatment.
That cannot be the foundation of a reformed football system.
Give qualified football people the opportunity to lead.
Then hold them to the same standards of competence, integrity and accountabilitydemanded of everyone else.
Paul Lucky Okoku
FIFA Legend | Former Nigeria Flying Eagles Vice-Captain | Former Super Eagles International | AFCON Silver Medalist | Football Historian | Football Analyst | Journalist-at-Large | Founder & CEO, Greater Tomorrow Children’s Foundation