Nigeria is in the news again for the wrong reason. From this week we cannot play any form of football on the African continent and worldwide.

Government has intervened continuously in the administration of football in Nigeria. As a matter of fact I think FIFA shares in the blame. Nigeria has hosted major football tournaments and each time she does FIFA is always so entangled to the Nigerian government in manners that beat my imaginations.

I think the Nigerian government got carried away by the relationship it had with FIFA and so the individuals in government did not know when to draw the lines.

We have hosted the U-21 and U-17 championships and on both occasions FIFA was actually dealing directly with the Federal and States Governments. Jack Warner knows all about these.

I am not saying FIFA is totally as fault. I mean FIFA had permitted the permeation of football administration and tournament organisation by the Nigerian government on two occasions instead of insisting on the football association in Nigeria to do the proper organisation and hosting.

FIFA permitted the Nigerian government to apply the fire brigade approach on two occasions as mentioned above.

Anyway you will think that this ban will inculcate some lessons into the greedy and corrupt football/ government officials in Nigeria. Wait until the ban is lifted, it will be business as usual.

I can almost not see anywhere in Nigeria where we have learnt from history and past events. People with the shortest myopic perspective in the world live in Nigeria. As soon as an event passes, we forget the lessons and the never apply our hearts to wisdom on how to make things work better.

Football administration in Nigeria has been in the hands of crude and unintelligent minds-people who probably know nothing about football administration. If you conduct tests about football, sports and sports administration for these people, their level of mentality will leave you spell bound for the rest of your lives.

How did they get there? Good question.

In Nigeria my country of birth, merit is dead. They use one useless thing called federal character in assigning positions and assignments. It means any fool can occupy any top position because he is from a certain part of Nigeria. Nigerians are united with their lips while their hearts are far apart. They so hate one another you will not imagine the depth.

The FIFA ban is about football but it is a total reflection of what is wrong with Nigeria. It is part of the reason why poverty and diseases continue to spread like wild fires. In Nigeria the jobs are never given to the people who are qualified or fit for the positions. Some people call it paddy-paddy.

Federal character and paddy-paddy at the expense of both merit and technical know-how have completely destroyed Nigeria.

I am not happy about the ban but I am not in a rush either for it to be lifted.

Nigerians must learn one thing. That is at some point we must begin to do things the right way. We must do the right thing always.

Imagine a premiership football in Nigeria with no relegations…what type of nonsense and stupidity is that. Imagine also all the Hullaballoo about the election, annullment, court cases and so on. What is wrong with Nigeria and Nigerians?

The federal character must be abolished. The person who can and who is qualified should be elected or appointed to do a given job. If he or she fails there must be buoyant mechanisms to allow for replacement according to guidelines or constitutions.

This affects every aspect of our lives including the forthcoming (future) political elections.

Nigeria and Nigerians must negotiate the turning point of their common history, the status quo remain a consistent recipe for continuous failure and international embarrassments.

UPDATE:

FIFA provisionally lifted the ban and Nigeria can continue to play their qualifying games for the Nations Cup.