Liberia: The LFA Should Be Held Responsible for a Tarnished International Image

New Democrat (Monrovia)

4 May 2011

editorial

Nigerian football authorities are bitter over the manner in which they were treated here recently.

Mr. Austin Eguavoen, the 1994 Nigerian World Cup defender and now coach, left here in fury after he and his team were subjected to maltreatment, dumped in a dirty so-called hotel befitting scums.

“When we arrived in Liberia, they left us stranded at the airport for three hours and transported us to our hotel in a bus without ventilation,” he told reporters after the match.

“The hotel had no power; players slept on the floor; meals were served late, and we had to play on a pitch that resembled a course for horse racing,” fumed Eguavoen.

“My footballers were not able to express themselves on that surface, and it will be a different story when we meet again in two weeks time,” the coach promised Nigerians ahead of the Benin City return encounter.

Reports also say the personal belongings of the players were stolen, an act that is an indelible stigma on the country for which the LFA should answer.

The Nigerian scripts are the same as those that came from the Zimbabwean team earlier this year. They, too, were left stranded, taken to run-down hotel reportedly with financial links to LFA higher-ups, and dumped there.

The Nigerians, understandably angry, told LFA officials they deserved a better hotel accommodation they were prepared to pay for. This should have brought shame to LFA officials, if they appreciate the word ‘shame’ and its implication, for they play with sufficient money and should not let such situations occur. But some people are shameless.

Other reports say a Ghanaian female team was compelled to ride in their embassy’s bus. They were not prepared for the LFA’s ‘Red Carpet’ reception that both the Nigerians and Zimbabweans cannot forget.

What is evident in this country, as in most others around Africa, is that football is the extension of national politics because of its lucrative financial and other trappings. It is the safe and protective abode of the vain and the corrupt, for its management is ignored and left in the palms of leaking hands interested not in the advancement of the sport, but only in how much they run away with from the Federation of International Football Association (FIFA) and the Confederation of African Football (CAF), amongst the lucrative givers to the sport. With elections coming up within these giant world football organs, we can imagine how pretty LFA officials sit looking at the highest bidder for their ballot, as it has been in the past.

Like most national organizations, the LFA lacks monitoring, left on its own to play with gate intakes and the huge sums that pour in the name of a sport that is the fanatical attraction to many. The LFA has unlikely not been audited for decades, again leaving it to financial sharks who roam within its coffers with impunity having no interest in the development of the sport.

We are aware of the now accepted pattern, which are the defence and protection of the corrupt and the damnation of those who seek justice against theft of national funds. But what is at stake in this case is the country’s image and the message sent out there–Liberia is no-go, callous country for sports men and women deserving better treatment and self-respect. There, they treat visitors as they treat themselves. It is not a sporting country.

We believe that the LFA should not be left on its own if this national shame is to be countered. True, this is a post-war country, but this is no justification for the terrible leadership paralysis within the LFA translated on the international scene with all the burdens. Soon, self-respecting football and other sporting teams will boycott a country that subjects them to primitive treatment. With this, the gate intakes from lucrative international matches, along with other international funds, would end for justice to be done.

AllAfrica – All the Time