You be the judge, pls..... Ogunjobi and the NFF hammer (1) The decision by the Nigeria Football Federation to ban Chief Taiwo Ogunjobi, its former Secretary General and Technical Committee chairman, from all football activities for ten years, and Chief Rumson Baribote, former Chairman of the Nigeria Premier League and promoter of Nembe City FC, for fifteen years, may come off as the heaviest sanction ever handed down by the Glass House. Ogunjobi was found guilty of complicity in the frustration of the transfer of Nigerian former U-20 striker, Kayode Olarenwaju, by Ivorian club, ASEC Mimosas, which refused to surrender his International Transfer Certificate, ITC. Ogunjobi who claims that Olarenwaju is his ward as authorized by the player’s parents had ostensibly helped him into the Ivorian club which in turn sent him on loan to Swiss club, Lucerne. After his two-year contract, Olarenwaju sought to move on to other clubs. Moves to Tunisian Esperance and Hadjuk Split of Croatia were frustrated and the player had to return home to join Heartland of Owerri. Towards the pitch end of the last transfer season, Israeli side Maccabi Netanya agreed a deal with him and thus requested ASEC to hand over his ITC but ASEC refused, insisting the player’s contract with them subsists till November 2014 which Olarenwaju clearly denied. Hit by the logjam, Olarenwaju cried to the NFF accusing Ogunjobi of playing games with him. He told MTNFootball on August 22: “Chief Ogunjobi is holding me to ransom. He is standing between me and my career. When I got to ASEC I did not sign a contract with (them) because he told me he did everything on my behalf. I have tried to reach Ogunjobi several times on this matter and he has rebuffed my pleas for him to let me go.” His agent, Emeka Ezeala also accused Ogunjobi: “We even reached an agreement in January that the player be moved out of ASEC but Ogunjobi is insisting that he can only move from ASEC. The future of the boy is at stake and if care is not taken he will rut in Nigeria for nothing.” In reply, Ogunjobi explained thus: “I have a name to protect. How will I agree that a player owned by another club should be transferred through another club?” He put the blame on Emeka Ezeala whom he counter accused of avoiding getting Netanya to transact the transfer with ASEC. With concern for the player’s career and minding the rampant cases of enslavement of players by a section of Nigerian football pseudo agents and officials with vested interest, the NFF moved in. It requested ASEC to surrender the ITC but the club refused, insisting that interested clubs should come negotiate with them, contrary to Olarenwaju’s own position that he had served out what he knew to be two-year contract. During the Federations Cup on September 15, chairman of the investigative panel, Chris Green, in company with the NFF Secretary General, Musa Amadu, appealed to Ogunjobi to reconsider his stance and prevail on ASEC to release the ITC in other to beat the September 17 transfer deadline but Ogunjobi insisted that the responsibility was not his. Olarenwaju had had a piece of paper representing the only contract document available to him. It stated a three years obligation to ASEC from February 16, 2010 with a monthly salary of 300,000 FCFA for that season; Ogunjobi was to receive 150,000 FCFA from the 2011 season; in the 2012 season, the player’s salary was to increase to 400,000 FCFA while Ogunjobi would maintain the 150,000. The contract had the signature of ASEC president Roger Ouegnin but Olarenwaju claims that the signature attributed to him was not his. The panel invited Ogunjobi to tell all he knew. Ogunjobi insisted that he wanted the player to be physically present before he could testify. At that point, FIFA had ruled to clear Olarenwaju as a player of Heartland and the player was already away to Israel. The panel also received documents from ASEC stating its position and absolving Ogunjobi of any complicity. The ASEC document stated that Ogunjobi was not a signatory to the contract; was not at the signing ceremony; that Olarenwaju mandated them to be transferring 150,000 FCFA monthly through Ogunjobi to his parents in Nigeria; that that aspect of money transfer was not reflected in the contract on the request of the player; that before making the money transfer Ogunjobi, in agreement with the player, initially asked them to keep the money in Abidjan until he (Ogunjobi) would tell them when and how to send it to Nigeria, as the player may require. The panel was not impressed with Ogunjobi’s explanations neither was it with the presentation by ASEC. They found Ogunjobi guilty of complicity and brought down the hammer, as heavily. Different meanings have been read into the NFF sanction with Ogunjobi accusing its president, Aminu Maigari, of trying to emasculate him from the NFF elections coming up in 2014. “NFF just want to rope me in which is political because of my ambition. This investigation smacks of witch-hunting… I am being persecuted because of the 2014 elections into the NFF board, nothing more,” Ogunjobi had said to freedomonline.ng September 5. He has described the sanction as a huge joke that will not stand, banking on his influence among state FA chairmen to upturn the decision at the November 28 General Assembly of the NFF. Interestingly, the NFF moved further to state that the sanctions took immediate effect. Those who believe its all witch-hunting draw from the current political attitude of the governing bodies of world football, especially FIFA and CAF, which have engaged themselves in an orgy of disqualification of contenders for their presidencies. Many mighty men of FIFA and CAF have been felled thereby. Hard to believe that Jack Warner and Sepp Blatter could part ways and the former forced to resign from FIFA. Mohammed bin Hammam, former president of Asian Football Federation with very deep pocket of Arab money was seen as a tough contender against Sepp Blatter but he was found guilty of attempting to buy the votes of Caribbean officials and was handed a life ban. Manilal Fernando, Asian FC representative in the FIFA Executive Committee was in the trip and was also placed on suspension. Hammam won an appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sports, CAS, in the matter but he remains suspended by FIFA and effectively disabled from contesting. In Africa, CAF General Assembly in September 2012 adopted an amendment to its electoral rules ahead of its presidential elections held in March 2013 to disqualify persons who have not been members of its Executive Committee from contesting. The amendment introduced by the Algerian Football Association got the overwhelming approval of 44 members out of 51 in attendance. Accordingly, Ivorian Jacques Anouma, former member of the FIFA Executive Committee who had earlier announced his candidacy, as well Danny Jordaan, member of the FIFA Marketing and TV Board who had distinguishably driven the South African bid and organisation of the 2010 World Cup and the 2009 Confederations Cup, were effectively excluded. Attempt by Anouma to nullify the amendment was rejected at the CAS which held that the General Assembly enjoyed sovereignty. Case closed. Hayatou returned unopposed. Curiously, Hayatou had earlier admitted wrong doing and was reprimanded by the International Olympic Committee in December 2011 for illegally receiving about 100,000 French francs, from former FIFA marketing agent, ISL. He also was under investigation of the IOC ethics commission in 2012 which prompted FIFA to withdraw his appointment as head of the football event of the London 2012 Olympics. In the FIFA cash-for-votes scandal in which Nigeria’s Dr. Amos Adamu suffered the sting ops on him, there were murmurs that Hayatou accepted bride of about $1.5M from Asian officials to vote Qatar for the 2022 World Cup. This, though, has not be pursued and proven, so, Hayatou continues to call the shots especially with the exclusion rule which James Dorsey, a reputed writer on football politics, concludes “ensures that the continents football governing body remains a closed shop.” It is just as former BBC correspondent, Osasu Obayuwana, explains that “with so much power, perks and patronage at his disposal; and with greedy and self serving officials and committee members so rampant in African football, outright manipulation or subtle coercion is a piece of cake for the CAF president.” Could this therefore be the case between Maigari and Ogunjobi, a trickling down of the emerging political culture in world football? Do not the facts on the table suggest, in all simplicity, that Ogunjobi seems possibly to have admitted less than he knows about the Olarenwaju transfer saga? Opinions are divided and there are those who even push the arguments to more complicated ends suggesting that it is a vendetta opera, a move to flush out men of Amos Adamu’s clan from the NFF system, Ogunjobi being one of those who call him “the godfather.” There have been suggestions that Maigari’s men suspect that Adamu worked against his bid to get into the CAF Executive Committee at the Marakech, March 2013 CAF elections. After a year long campaign including revelations of a visit to Hayatou in Cameroun and talks with Adamu for his support, Maigari lost the West Zone B slot to Benin Republic’s Moucharafou Anjorin, polling 19 to 35 votes in the second round. After the election, the Nigerian Pilot quoted an unnamed Maigari aide as follows: “He worked against the candidacy of Maigari behind the scene. On approaching delegates for their votes, we were told that they had counter instructions from Nigeria to support the Beninois candidate...We had concrete evidence that our efforts were being frustrated by fellow country man, Adamu…If Maigari had won he would have been in CAF Executive Committee for four years, meaning when Adamu’s ban is lifted in June, chances of him returning to the body would have been slim…It has been well calculated by Adamu’s camp…” Adamu’s man, John Atale, had promptly denied the allegation pointing out that same Anjorin had also lost same election earlier in 2011 in Khartoum, Sudan. Nigeria’s Ibrahim Galadima also lost in the election and a few people also attributed the failure to Adamu’s opposition. Interestingly, while many feel that Adamu should not be constructed into the root of every failure of Nigerians in CAF, former Abia governor and a football promoter of international repute, Chief Orji Uzor Kalu, suggests that Adamu has such powers. Kalu who revealed that he lobbied Hayatou to bring Adamu into CAF was quoted to have lamented Maigari’s loss as follows: “If Adamu was there Nigeria will not lose. If the NFF and the sports minister had consulted me, we will not lose… every game has its language and we know the kind of language to speak to the delegates from both the Francophone and Anglophone countries and they will put everything on the table…” Whether Ogunjobi is guilty as charged by the NFF or he is being persecuted as a member of the “powerful” Amos Adamu clan being accused of opposing Maigaris election into CAF or he is being deliberately excluded from the political process leading up to the 2014 NFF elections, the cards are here on the table. Interestingly, different people will make their judgments according to different ineterests. Ha h ha ha ha ha........ Later, on Baribote
Posted on: Wed, 16 Oct 2013 14:33:00 +0000
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