By: Monday Nas Ozoya, MCIMSPA, MEASM, MIEEE.
My answer is no.
However, saying that the NFF did not completely fail does not mean Nigerian football has been managed as effectively as it should have been.
These are two different conclusions.
The system has produced achievements. The Super Falcons won Nigeriaβs record-extending tenth Womenβs Africa Cup of Nations title in 2025. Coaching education resumed, including CAF B courses, a women-only CAF C programme and plans to restore CAF A licensing after a long absence. FIFA Forward funding has also supported new accommodation and training facilities for the national teams.
These are meaningful achievements. They should be recognised.
The NFF also continued to organise national teams, domestic competitions, refereeing programmes and international football activities. Its Congress approved audited financial statements, while reforms to the NFF Statutes and electoral framework were undertaken.
Therefore, describing everything associated with the NFF as a failure would be inaccurate and unfair to the players, coaches, officials, administrators, volunteers and partners who produced positive results.
But achievements are not the same as institutional success.
A federation can win trophies and still possess serious structural weaknesses.
It can organise coaching courses without having enough qualified coaches working regularly at grassroots level.
It can build national-team facilities while communities still lack safe playing grounds.
It can approve audited accounts without making detailed financial and performance information easily accessible to the public.
It can organise tournaments without establishing reliable, year-round youth leagues across the states.
It can celebrate talented players without maintaining a national database showing where those players, coaches, referees, academies and facilities are located.
This is the distinction Nigerian football must understand:
The NFF did not completely fail. The system produced achievements, but important structural weaknesses remained.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubuβs August 2026 directive for comprehensive football reform referred to repeated failures to qualify for major competitions. The subsequent resignations of the NFF president, general secretary, and executive committee were presented as creating space for an orderly reform process to address longstanding institutional, governance, and developmental challenges.
That development should not lead us to erase every achievement of the previous administration. Neither should those achievements prevent us from asking difficult questions.
The proper assessment is not simply:
Did Nigeria win a trophy?
We must also ask:
β’ Was the Football Masterplan implemented and evaluated?
β’ Did every state FA operate measurable grassroots programmes?
β’ Were seasonal youth leagues established across age groups?
β’ Did womenβs football receive sustained investment beyond national-team competitions?
β’ Were academies properly licensed and graded?
β’ Could parents verify the qualifications of those coaching their children?
β’ Were safeguarding systems enforced across affiliated football?
β’ Were public resources connected to published outcomes?
β’ Did clubs become more financially stable?
β’ Did Nigerian football develop reliable data for planning and regulation?
The next NFF leadership must build upon what worked, correct what failed and publish evidence of both.
Reform should not become revenge against former officials. It should not be another change of personalities without changing institutional behaviour.
Nigeria requires an NFF that measures success through national-team performance, grassroots participation, functioning leagues, player welfare, qualified personnel, safe facilities, commercial growth and public accountability.
The honest conclusion is therefore:
The NFF was not a total failure.
But Nigerian football has not yet developed the transparent, structured, accountable and data-led system its talent deserves.
The question for the next leadership is no longer whether previous administrations achieved anything.
The real question is:
Can the next NFF administration convert isolated achievements into a football system that works consistently across Nigeria?
