NPFL: HERALDING THE IDEAL FOOTBALL ECOSYSTEM
By Quadri Labaika
By dint of divine ordinance, Nigeria is blessed with abundant of sporting talents that spread across the length and breadth of the country. Indeed, it is a grave dereliction that the country is failing to turn the endowment into a useful consumer product that will contribute to the nation’s economy.
Apart from the burgeoning talents-driven industry like Music, Movies, and lately, the tech start-up industry which are exponentially booming in the country. Another Gold mine waiting to be exploited to join the foray is the football industry.
Football all over the world has evolved from what was once known as mere recreation to a multi-billion-dollar industry. However, Nigeria, the highest exporter of football players in Africa and 12th in the world according to a study conducted by CIES Football Observatory (Center for International Sports Studies) in Switzerland, is yet to realize the business angle of the game.
The report prepared by Ernst & Young for the Premier League in 2019-20 showed that the league made a $10.4 billion economic impact on the UK. The League supported 94,000 jobs, paying about $4 billion in salaries, while clubs paid $4.9 billion in taxes. $2.5 billion went to the supply chain. Likewise, international fans traveling to Premier League games generated $602 million.
With an estimated worth valued at around N10 billion annually, according to the defunct League Management Company (LMC), the Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) has the potential to create thousands of direct and indirect jobs when fully annexed. However, the reality of the league’s present state is far from reaching this figure.
The current structure of club ownership can be classified into government ownership, private but politically inclined ownership, and private but passion-driven ownership.
The first of the aforementioned accounts for 90% of the clubs, as virtually all the state governments of the federation own one or more clubs.
The second is also similar to the first, as the owners' primary intention here is geared toward achieving political purposes rather than making money out of the business. Typical examples are Abubakar Bukola Saraki FC (ABS), FC Ifeanyi Ubah, Go Round FC, and a few others. The problem mainly associated with this category is that the clubs are not sustained beyond the time their proprietor is either in government or enjoying government patronage. This is evident in ABS FC owned by former Kwara State Governor Bukola Saraki and also FC Ifeanyi Ubah owned by Senator Ifeanyi Ubah. The two clubs have continued to nosedive since the duo left the government or stopped enjoying patronage as in the case of Ifeanyi whose company stopped getting patronage after the emergence of former President Muhammadu Buhari over his preferred candidate, former President Goodluck Jonathan, whom he supported openly as one of the directorates for contact and mobilization of Goodluck Jonathan National Campaign Organization in the 2015 general election.
The third category can be said to have been born out of the owner’s passion for the game, not necessarily because of the business angle, as the present structure of the league does not attract a business-oriented individual to invest. This can be seen in teams like Remo Stars SC, Vandrezzer FC, and most recently Sporting Lagos FC. Despite how unattractive and poorly run the industry is, the passion for the game has kept them going, and they are striving to create the ecosystem themselves.
Football industry in its formative years as in the case of Nigeria requires huge capital to set up the necessary infrastructure that will ensure a well-function ecosystem. Hence, the state’s backing is needed. As rightly established, the government remains the largest contributor of funds to the league, sadly with little or no returns to the government coffers. To bring about a well-established ideal football ecosystem that will contribute to the GDP, the government have to set the tone by showing the political will.
In as much as no rule bars the government from club ownership, it is however a sad reality that the government has failed woefully in the management of these clubs despite the huge sums of money spent over the years. This is not peculiar to the sports sector alone but an endemic that cuts across virtually all government ventures in the country. The bane of which is the failure to put people of capacity at the helm of affairs which is not farfetched from the political bargainings the politicians always have with their political allies and cronies.
To correct this, the government must redirect its investment in the industry from ownership to putting in place a conducive environment that will attract private sector investment in the league. To this end, the government should rather gear its efforts towards building new standard stadiums or rehabilitating the existing ones, as the case may be, and provide grants to the league organizer when needed.
If these fundamental issues are addressed, the club ownership of the league and overall businesses will change. This will facilitate investment from business-oriented people whose preoccupation will be majorly profit-driven — which is currently missing from the club ownership structure of the league. At the same time complimenting the already existing private passion-driven owners and naturally freezes out the government ownership and private but politically inclined owners.
Football in Nigeria, aside from the potential economic viability as proven over the years to have positive impacts on the mood of the nation. Considering how polarized and disintegrated the country is along the ethno-religious lines, football can serve as a unifying factor to unite the country while also contributing positively to the economy.
