FIFA Suspends Nigeria; Stops Falcons from Women World Cup

True to its threats, the World football governing body, FIFA, has suspended Nigeria till further notice following what it termed government interfered in the running of football in Nigeria.

The most immediate effect of the ban is that Nigeria will not be allowed to participate in the upcoming FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup, coming up in Canada between August 5 and 24, except the suspension is lifted by July 15, 2014. Also, the country will also forfeit an U-17 African qualifier in Democratic Republic of Congo, slated for July 20, if the ban is not lifted before that date.

But the NFF in a statement late on Wednesday denied that FIFA had stopped Falconets from travelling. In the statement by the NFF’s Acting General Secretary, Lawrence Katken, the body said, “It is a blatant lie to say FIFA refused to issue tickets to the Falconets. What happened was that the former General Secretary, Musa Amadu, mistakenly cancelled the earlier reservations, so when the delegation got to the airport, they could not find seats on the flight.

“FIFA has told us they are working hard at alternatives, because Lufthansa Airline flights from Abuja are fully booked for the next weeks, and promised to get the players and officials to their training camp in Canada even if they have to travel in batches, from Thursday."

But those in the know are of the view that FIFA has taken its action and nothing will change until the issue that made the body suspend Nigeria in the first place is addressed as prescribed by FIFA's rules.

It would be recalled that Nigeria was banned from age group competitions for two years by FIFA in December 1989 after the organisation discovered age discrepancies involving some of its top internationals; Samson Siasia, Andrew Uwe and Dahiru Sadi.