…as warring factions set for parallel polls
Basketball players in Nigeria are hoping that the election into the board of the Nigeria Basketball Federation scheduled for Monday (today) will usher in a new dawn for the sport in the next four years.
However, hope for a ‘new dawn’ seem far away as there are strong indications that parallel elections might hold in Abuja and Benin City, the Edo State capital, today, after the sports ministry and members of the former board of the federation failed to agree on a venue for the election.
The sports ministry, it was learnt, picked Abuja as the venue of the poll, while the congress of the erstwhile NBBF board led by Musa Ahmadu-Kida, who’s also vying for a second term, chose Benin City as their preferred venue.
But a sports ministry official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said they never made a picked a venue for the disputed poll.
“They (NBBF) have an electoral committee, they will decide how and where they conduct their election,” he said.
World body FIBA had given the federation latest January 31 to conduct its election or risk a ban after Ahmadu-Kida’s tenure ended in May 2021. An earlier attempt to hold the poll in Benin City October 30, 2021 was scuttled after the sports ministry issued a directive on the indefinite suspension of the NBBF’s elective congress, after hundreds of placard-carrying protesters, wearing shirts with the inscription ‘Kida must go’, protested in Abuja against the re-election of Ahmadu-Kida as president of the federation, few days to the scuttled poll.
However, there are conflicting signals that the federation could be heading for a stalemate once again.
Last week, some basketball players staged a protest at the sports ministry over the leadership crisis.
A presidential aspirant and proprietor of Mark Mentors, Mark Igoche, told SUNDAY PUNCH in an interview that he would boycott the Benin City elections, insisting it was not the legitimate polls to usher in a new board into the federation.
“Obviously, I’m not going to Benin because I don’t believe it and it doesn’t tally with me.”
But FIBA Zone 3 president, Col. Sam Ahmedu (retd.) a former board member of the Ahmadu-Kida-led NBBF said the election in Benin City had the backing of FIBA.
“Igoche is not a presidential aspirant. He did not pick a form from the electoral committee for the position, so what is he boycotting? You only boycott what you have registered for.
“There will be no election in Abuja; anyone that goes there is wasting his time. Benin is where the congress will be.”
Igoche also faulted the NBBF constitution amended by the Ahmadu-Kida board.
Igoche added, “The problem we have with the NBBF is that document they call the constitution, that document that Ahmadu-Kida singlehandedly amended without the vote of the board members and took it to FIBA. We don’t know which FIBA, because you can’t tell me that FIBA will rectify that kind of document.”
Our correspondent learnt that delegates were already in both cities, with 21 states chairmen/representatives in Abuja, as at the time of filing this report, while a large number of electorates were also in Benin City, the Edo State capital.
Players have endured a torrid time in the last four years after Ahmadu-Kida’s predecessor Tijjani Umar dragged Ahmadu-Kida to court over the legitimacy of his position as the federation’s president.
Due to the crisis, the men’s basketball league had been on hold for the past three years, with a high number of the players giving up on the sport, to earn a living elsewhere.
D’Tigers and Rivers Hoopers centre, Victor Koko, pleaded with the aspirants to take the results of the elections in good faith for the future of the sport and the players, whose only means of livelihood is basketball.
“If this crisis continues, it will affect the players the more because the administrators don’t earn their living from basketball, we players do and we are the ones suffering from the fight,” Koko told The PUNCH.
“I hope they can leave out their differences and come together to develop the game, so we can have a better tomorrow.
“We don’t want to experience the sufferings of the last four years again. So many talents have been wasted just because of a position,” Koko added.
Another player, who spoke to The PUNCH on the condition of anonymity, said, “For the past four years we’ve had factions. When the bigwigs fight, the players always suffer. I hope wherever the election is held, they can come to an agreement, if not, then we are in for another four years of lamentation.”
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