Former Nigeria Premier League chairman, Oyuiki Obaseki says he is happy with the action of club owners to remove the immediate past chairman of the Nigeria Premier League, Victor Baribote, on Wednesday, stressing the sorry state of the Nigerian league and expressing the hope that the removal will bring solution to the league’s dwindling fortunes.
With less than 48 hours to the NPL’s Annual General Meeting in Kano, the board was dissolved by 16 Premier League club representatives at an emergency meeting held in Abuja with Mike Idoko leading an interim 6-man board that will work for two months.
“I feel very bad and sad about the dissolution. Each time I reflect on the dwindling fortunes of the league we worked very hard to build, I weep. I had called for a probe tirelessly to no avail,” he said.
“The congress said the board was not doing well, that’s fine. But if people come from outside to make money from the league, then we will be five years behind.
“But my happiness is that it is not the Nigeria Football Federation that dissolved the board but the clubs, who are the owners of the league.”
Baribote refused to respond to the call or reply the SMS message sent to him by our correspondent on Wednesday.
Director of the Ondo State Football Agency, Idoko, said Baribote was removed because there was no transparency and accountability in the way he handled the league. He said the former NPL board had hindered the development of the league.
“This action is in the interest of the league and Nigerian football. Clubs used to benefit financially from the title sponsorship money and at a point we were fighting for an increase in the money. But in the last two seasons, the clubs have been made to bear the brunt of the NPL’s inability to source for sponsors.
“Clubs spend heavily on match indemnities due to the inefficiency of the board under Baribote while the players suffer because the little the clubs have was used in covering the glaring inefficiency of the board,” he said.