Former Chairman of Heartland of Owerri, Fan Ndubuoke is a thoroughbred football professional. Having cut his teeth as a sports reporter, he rose to the position of sports editor before becoming publisher of the now-rested Sports Link. Ndubuoke, a former National President of the Sports Writers Association of Nigeria in this interview with JOHN EGBOKHAN faults claims by Aminu Maigari that he was the most successful NFF President and questions Amaju Pinnick’s plan to make Maigari life President of the NFF. Excerpts

During the last Elective Congress of the NFF, Aminu Maigari flaunted his scorecard as being the most successful board. But in reality, it appears that is not the case.

Exactly, that is most untrue. It is a lie, which the media, especially broadcast journalists have bought and are daily saying during their news presentation. The most successful NFF board of all time remains the one led by the late Emeka Omeruah.

It was the first duly elected NFF board. It was during his time that our Golden Eaglets, comprising former Super Eagles captain, Nwankwo Kanu and Wilson Oruma won the FIFA U-17 World Cup in Japan in 1993. In the same 1993, the Omeruah’s board also successfully qualified the Super Eagles for the first time to the FIFA World Cup, USA ’94.

I was a member of the committee that got the ticket to the World Cup during the match against Algeria in Algiers. It was the first time that our senior national team was qualifying for the World Cup and we went to USA ’94, won two quality matches against Bulgaria and Greece before losing in dramatic circumstances to Italy in the second round.

At the end of the tournament, we rose to the fifth position in the FIFA ranking, which remains our best position till date on the global ranking index of football nations.

In 1994, it was also during the time of the Omeruah’s board that the Super Eagles won the Africa Cup of Nations for the first time outside Nigeria in Tunis. In 1996, Nigeria also won its first soccer gold at the Olympics Games in Atalanta.

It was described as the mother of all gold medals and it was the first time also during the tenure of Omeruah. Under Omeruah, our referees also officiated at the continental and international levels. So I am baffled when I heard that Maigari’s board was the most successful NFF board. Placed side by side with Omeruah, it is clear that Maigari did not achieve up to half of what Omeruah achieved

What was the winning strategy used by the board of Omeruah?

We had a well-laid down structure that ensured that all hands were on deck to take our football to Olympian heights. Under Omeruah, wehad a system where the national team coaches were answerable to the technical committee, who were also answerable to the board of the NFF.

Our roles were well-defined, not the type of shoddy arrangement that we had in the last board headed by Maigari, where the coaches were always at loggerheads with the technical committee. During our time, all coaches must defend their team list before the technical committee.

That’s why I told Amaju Pinnick, when we spoke earlier that his first task is to rebuild our national teams and ensure that our national coaches stop being emperors in terms of selection of players because their reason for such selection is simply economical.

Pinnick must make sure that coaches are answerable to only the board and not to any other interested body. Pinnick appears to be a good choice to be the head of the NFF because of his passion and drive for sponsorship and innovation but having looked at the other members of the board, I have my doubts on what they can achieve because two trees cannot make a forest. Apart from one or tow persons, the other board members have no reason to be there.

Do you think Pinnick is on the right track?

Pinnich Amaju

He means well for Nigerian football but I think that there was no reason for him to think of making Maigari a life President of the NFF. I s he trying to pay him back for helping him become head of the NFF?

This country has never been so embarrassed the way we were under Maigari. In any case, it is the board and not Pinnick that will decide whether to make Maigari life President, which he does not deserve because he didn’t achieve more than Omeruah, who was not made life President.

If Pinnick wants to achieve, he should not think of second term but concentrate on working because that was what derailed us during the tenure of Maigari, whose board, was busy plotting how to secure second term when we were at Brazil 2014 World Cup. Pinnick should think of the way to make NFF self-sufficient and correct all the illegalities surrounding the body.

If he forgets about second term, he will succeed and write his name in gold. I wish him well and have confidence that he can do it.

One issue that is before the board of Pinnick is that of renewing the contract of Stephen Keshi as Eagles coach. Has he done enough to merit this extension?

I am not a fan of Keshi. Even if he wins the FIFA World Cup, I don’t think he should be our coach, let alone granted a renewal. I don’t believe that Keshi invites players on merit. It is also during the time of Keshi, either as a captain or coach that we had issues over players bonuses. Go and check the records and you will see that I am on point. So I don’t see why Pinnick and his members should extend his deal.

There are better coaches, I even have a name that I can give but will not so that people will not think I am holding brief for the individual. How can we give Keshi a contract when it is during his time that we are playing without a creative midfielder? When you tell him to invite Kelechi Iheanacho, who fits into that position, he tells you that he is too young.

What a flimsy and lazy excuse. Iheanacho is the only one, like Okocha and Kanu, who can easily fill that position. Even Ikechukwu Ibenegu, a local player with Heartland, who has creative tendencies, was overlooked by Keshi.

I think that we should get our coaches to be answerable to only the federation.

Even if he wins the matches against Sudan, Keshi is not the right coach for Nigeria.

So are you advocating for a foreign coach?

I have a good idea of who can coach our Eagles but won’t go further than that for now.

As a former chairman of Heartland, why is our league not the foundation stone of the national team?

Our local players are often overlooked by national coaches. How many matches do our coaches watch? Only recently, Enyimba and Heartland played the Oriental derby and I was surprised that our national coaches were not there to see such an important match for scouting purposes. Our coaches don’t have respect for our local league and that is why Keshi will go as far as inviting five new players from unknown foreign leagues for the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying match against Sudan next month.

The league has its own problems but I commend Irabor for what he has done but he needs to improve on officiating aspect. Referees must be financially viable to officiate a league match, so that they can shun bribes from desperate club chairmen, who want victories at any cost, to justify the huge sum of money they get from their state governments.

But it is often said that most state governments starve these clubs of their yearly allocations, so how come the need to justify the huge amount from government?

It is not true that governors do not give their clubs money to pay their players. I was a former Chairman of Heartland and know what I am saying. That is why I also believe that being Chairman of a club does not mean that you will not do others jobs, instead of using the club’s money to run your personal show. So if there is no money, how come that most chairmen don’t want to leave their positions? It is because there is money that some of them, even built big mansions after just a month from the money given to the club by the governors.

It is because of the free money from government that they want to stay and die in their positions.

The way out is for government to hands off football and give funds only to the national teams. Even in Europe and America, no club is funded by state governments. In Nigeria, only two teams are owned by private individuals and by the end of the season, they will be relegated because that they do not have government funding.