By Tony Ubani
Nigeria Football Federation may not be as buoyant as they planned to execute all their programmes this year.

It was revealed in South Africa that only about half of a proposed 1.4 billion Naira (less than $9 million) budget was approved.

It was gathered from officials here at the Nations Cup in South Africa that the government only approved 790 million Naira (about $5 million) from their proposed expenditure.

And of this approved budget, the Nigeria sports ministry has released only 490 million Naira to the NFF with a promise to release the balance this week.

The ministry also received another 220 million Naira ($1.3 million) for the Nations Cup.

“The NFF are groaning under serious financial problems in South Africa as they only received about half of the budget approved for them,” a top source informed MTNFootball.com

“There is a promise for them to get the balance of this budget but even then that may not be adequate as what was finally approved was just about half of their request.”

Nigeria have had to step down on a bonus scheme that would have fetched each player about $100,000 were they to win the on-going AFCON in South Africa.
Officials said the money problems will continue for the remaining part of a year in which the NFF have to prosecute six 2014 World Cup qualifiers beginning with a home game against Kenya in March.

Nigeria will also feature at the African Youth Championship, the African Junior Championship as well as the African Beach Soccer Championship all in 2013..