I have the pedigree to be NFF President – Barrister Seyi Akinwunmi

By Saheed Afolabi

The coast is getting clearer now as the first vice president of NFF and the chairman of Lagos State Football Association (LSFA), Barrister Seyi Akinwunmi obtained his form and successfully got screened to run for the president of the Nigeria Football Federation NFF).

After having started his football administrative career from the bottom and rose to the top, most football lovers believe Barrister Seyi Akinwunmi is the best man to be the next NFF President.

Barrister Seyi Akinwunmi said he shares the view of the people that called on him to run for the position of President of NFF and he has the pedigree and what other other candidates have individually, he has them together in him.

The legal luminary, who’s a one time lawyer to the LSFA before rising to the top as chairman of LSFA and first vice president of NFF.

In this exclusive interview with ECHONEWS, the well respected football administrator spoke about his plans for Nigeria football if elected as NFF President.

“I’m very happy for people who called on me to run for the position of the NFF President and I shed their views.

“I have the pedigree to aspire for the position of President of NFF and what other candidates have individually, I have them together in me.

“I started as a lawyer to the Lagos State Football Association (LSFA), then, I became the football adviser to the minister of sport, I was appointed into the presidential committee of football development by for former president, Goodluck Jonathan, I became the Lagos State Football Association (LSFA) chairman, I was the chairman of the CAF beach soccer tournament in Lagos, thereafter, I became the chairman of the Western Nigeria football forum and I’ve been the chairman of the Nigeria National League (NNL) and during my time as the chairman of NNL, the clubs stopped paying match indemnities, I have been the founding member of the League Management Company (LMC) committee and I have also done grassroots football as you know, I’m also the present first vice president of NFF, I started from the bottom to the top.

“On the other hand, I have been the chairman of the NFF reform committee and also a member of the football ten years masterplan committee.

“You can also see that I have interacted with the change that the people want for our football and if you juxtapose all of this together, I think I’m better equip to be the president of NFF.

“My mantra for my campaign is called ‘Football First’ and Football First rest on 4 pillars, that’s Football development, Football infrastructure, football technology and Business of football.

“What I intend to do is to reinvent the way we run football, presently, we run the bottom to top approach and the NFF says you do this, you do that but the NFF doesn’t have the budget for the states FA who are it affiliates.

“So I intend to run the top to bottom approach, that I intend to lead a team that will draw a horizontal line across Nigeria football and above that line is the NFF doing what he does the national teams, national trainings, national courses, doing business trying to get sponsors, interfacing with the government, interfacing with CAF and FIFA.

“Below that line, we have the local government councils, that’s the State FA, the regionals (They will be the interface between the NFF and the States FA), what will happen is that, every year, the NFF will provide an allocation for each state FA and pays them quarterly, at the end of each quarter, the NFF will audit what each state FA chairman have done based on the purpose that the money is meant for. Then you are entitled to get the next tranche of allocation and this helps the FA grow.

“Then we have tournaments at the state FA level and I should be able to do it, as long as I meet the minimum requirements, there are various level of tournaments that we can have. The requirements of some tournaments might just be 4 teams and they would build their own stadium of maybe 1 or 2 thousand capacity and with that, you can develop football across board and that makes state FA proud of itself and people will start to invest in the states FA.”