WE’VE BUILT A SOLID NPFL FOUNDATION DESPITE CHALLENGES – IMC CHIEF ELEGBELEYE

By Farouq Oduola A.

The Nigeria Professional Football League’s (NPFL) Interim Management Committee (IMC) Chairman, Hon. Gbenga Elegbeleye, stated that the body is on track to deliver a successful NPFL season, adding that the body has “encountered challenges but have built a solid foundation” for the league.

At a press conference on Tuesday Mach 28 at the GTI House in Marina Lagos, the chairman made this statement while outlining the achievements of the body at the mid-season report of the 2022–2023 NPFL season.

Elegbeleye noted that the NPFL season has been stabilized and abridged to balance with other leagues with more improvements in fixture adjustments.

According to him, not only had indemnities to match officials been paid off, but their wages has also been enhanced by 50%. The quality of officiating has also been improved.

“When we came in we met a number of Nigerian Referees being owed indemnity for over three years. We’ve finished the obligation to outstanding payment of indemnities, and we also increase the amount paid by 50 percent and also challenge the officials to up their performances to deliver officiating based on global standards.”

He stated that the body has established a mechanism to prevent misconduct by clubs and their supporters and has also been able to ensure the safety of match officials.

“We charge match commissioners to permit matches to start only when security officials are on ground. In addition, any assault on a referee will attract maximum sanction on clubs.

“We continue to monitor any game from our situation room and have called for review when anything is wrong.”

Elegbele praised the IMC’s collaboration with GTI Asset Management and Trust Fund groups to get the league back on TV and other platforms and expressed his gratitude to the match officials.

Elegbeleye claims that working with GTI group “has seen to the development of quality in the visuals of our matches on TV and other platforms like YouTube.”

The partnership also has marketing strategies for the short, medium, and long terms that will influence how the League is funded.

The Nigeria Football Trust Funds’ Project Director, Ine Nelson, noted earlier in the conference that the stakeholders anticipate advancing the NPFL into the global stage where it belongs.

He added that the NPFL should be viewed as a national asset rather than just a football league.

“The need for the strategic partnership between GTI and IMC is to reposition the league for sustainable and accelerated growth and development.

“It is our own “green oil” because of the capacity of what it has to deliver.”

Nelson, who lauded the partnership’s contributions, highlighted the necessity for the NPFL and the sports sector as a whole to begin contributing its own quota to the GDP of the country.

“We believe that in another five years, the government will gradually transfer control while the players earn as much as N5 million per month in salary because there will be competition from investors in the league.”

“If the league must prosper, the private sector must play its part,” he said.

After providing a thorough breakdown of the match statistics for the first half of the season, the head of operations for the NPFL, Davidson Owumi, stated that the location of the upcoming Super Six fixtures has not yet been decided.

“We have certain venues in our mind that have no Premier League team but  Abuja and Lagos are provisional venues,” Owumi said.

The Group Managing Director of GTI, Abubakar Lawal was also present at the press conference.

The top three clubs from Groups A and B will compete for the title in the Super Six, while the bottom two teams from each group will drop back to the Nigeria National League, the second division.

The 2022–23 NPL season is an abridged league with the 20 clubs drawn into two groups.