The danger of taking football matters to ordinary courts

In August 2017, nineteen Football stakeholders took the Sierra Leone Football Association (SLFA), its President Madam Isha Johansen, its two Vice Presidents; Brima Mazolla Kamara, Alie Kargbo, and its two Ex-Officio members; Alie Badara Tarawallie and Harold Nat Johnson to court, seeking an injunction to restrain the five Executive members from running the affairs of the Sierra Leone Football Association and also from operating the association’s bank accounts after their term of office ended on August 3 “until the determination of the substantive matter”.

Upon serving the sermon to the SLFA Secretariat and the five Executive members, the court ordered a temporal injunction with immediate effect and added: “An order to appoint a receiver in the persons of one of the Regional Chairmen who have legitimacy as Vice President is hereby granted”.

Following this ruling, FIFA immediately ordered that the  congress be postponed until integrity checks on current and potential SLFA executive members had been carried out.

Despite the call for integrity checks, FIFA added that it will continue to recognise the Johansen-led SLFA leadership until elections are conducted.

What this means is that Johansen continued as president of the Sierra Leone Football Federation until June 2021. This was after she has used the platform to seek election and won a seat into the FIFA Council in March, 2021.

 After that victory, Johansen publicly declared her intention to step down from the presidential race which later saw the emergence in June, 2021, of Thomas Daddy Brima as New President of the Sierra Leone Football Association. 

Thesame scenario is about to play out in Nigeria following a federal high Court ruling in Yenagoa stopping a proposed NFF congress initially proposed, to set a road map to the 2022 NFF elections. 

On December 15, 2021, a Federal Court sitting in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa state capital, stopped the Nigerian Football Federation's Planned annual General Assembly In Lagos. The judge ruled on Wednesday that the NFF's Assembly slated for December 17 should not hold, following an ex parte application filed with a motion on notice in suit number, FHC/YNG/CS/133/2021.

The implication of this ruling is that, the Executive committee of the NFF in trying to respect the court order has decided to stay action on all matters relating to the election, claiming, that they will not want to do anything that goes contrary to the laws of the land. 

On the other hand, aggrieved football stakeholders are busy grumbling in their hideouts, threatening to cause another crisis if the executive committee of the NFF fails to convene a general assembly in good time, inorder to urgently fix a date for an elective congress before the end of the third quarter of 2022. 

    

The FIFA Statutes clearly states that the executive committee must call a general assembly at least one year to the elective congress to set a road map to the election. 

Unfortunately, the events of the last two years caused by the outbreak of the novel Corona Virus Pandemic, means that a lot of activities had to be postponed as the world battled to curtail the spread of the virus. 

That perhaps explains why the congress date was initially fixed for December 17, 2021 before it was stopped by a court injunction from Yenagoa 

It is two months since that court ruling and nothing seem to have changed. As it stands, everything now points to an extension of tenure for the incumbent NFF president, Amaju Melvin Pinnick and members of his executive committee

The calculation is simple. If the court position persists till April, the NFF will have no other option than to stay calm and watch as events unfolds. 

As it is, it is only if and when the court order is withdrawn that the NFF executive committee can convene a congress to fashion out a roadmap to the election. 

Unfortunately, as it stands, there is no way the NFF elections can hold this year, meaning that there is the possibility that the election can only take place in 2023 which coincidentally is the year for the federal elections in Nigeria. What this means therefore, is that, even if the NFF election will hold in 2023, it will be after the swearing in of the new president on May 29, 2023. 

In the coming months, the drama and the intrigues leading to the election will get more intense especially after the World Cup qualifiers in March but like Isha Johansen, Amaju certainly has the backing of his executive committee members, CAF and FIFA. 

He knows that the key thing at this point is to retain the trust and confidence of his team and get all the assurances he needs from the confederation of Africa football CAF and the World Football governing body FIFA. 

The former Chairman of Delta state football commission has risen so fast in less than eight years to become one of the most powerful football administrators in the world. 

Apart from South Africa's multi billionaire Patrice Motsepe who occupies the exalted position of CAF president, Nigeria's Amaju Pinnick is also ranked as one of the most influential and most respected football administrators in the world. 

For this reason, it will be absolutely stupid for anyone to think or imagine that he could be easily pushed aside or forced to step down by any other means than through what is obtained in the FIFA Statutes.