Despite Gaddafi’s fate, Africa’s despotstrudge on

Sulaimon
Olanrewaju
reports
that
despite
the
dethronement
and
death
of
Muammar
Gaddafi,
former
Libyan
ruler,
which has further decimated the rank of
Africa's despots, the continent's remaining
dictators show no sign of relinquishing
power even after being in the saddle for
decades.
AT the initial stage of his 42-year reign in
Libya, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi was the
common man's hero as he pandered to the
whims of the people. He brought visible
changes to the country and made life
meaningful to the average citizens. He was
said to have provided electricity, housing,
education, infrastructure, health care,
employment, executed world's largest
irrigation project, shared part of the oil
receipts with the people and more. But he
ran into problem with his people because
he denied them their fundamental right; the
right to choose their own leaders.
Throughout his 42-year reign, he
successfully reined in opposition. He
brooked no contrary opinion; everyone
who voiced a converse concern was treated
as an enemy because dissent was
pronounced illegal in 1973 and those found
guilty of the law either ended up six feet
below the ground level or hundreds of
miles away in foreign lands. In 1974, the
former Libyan ruler also declared that
anyone found guilty of forming a political
party would be executed. Thus, Gaddafi
steadily depleted opposition groups until he
came to see himself as Lord over Libya. By
then, he had reached the peak as Libya's
maximum ruler, but that also was the
beginning of his decline.
As more people who Gaddafi perceived as
enemies escaped from Libya, the exiles
began to gather outside their homeland to
form a force against Gaddafi. The exiles,
working in concert with dissatisfied Libyans
within the country, formed an interim
government known as the National
Transition Council (NTC), which capitalised
on the delay in the delivery of housing
units promised by the government to cause
unrest by staging series of protests in
January this year. The government
promptly reacted to this by floating a
20billion euro investment fund to provide
housing and development.
Though the government's gesture scaled
down the level of protest, it did not last as
there were fresh outbreaks of violence in
February. Aided by the North Atlantic Treaty
Organisation (NATO) forces, the Libyan crisis
escalated daily until it became a civil war.
Initially, Gaddafi discountenanced the
protesters, but with the fall of Benghazi in
February, followed by Tobruk, Misrata,
Bayda and other cities, the heat became
very fierce on the maximum ruler. But there
was no respite until he eventually lost
Tripoli to the rebels and was later captured
in his home town of Sirte before being
killed.
Gaddafi was the hero of many African
despots because he was seen to be firmly in
control of his country and had enough
resources to ward off unwanted foreign
meddling even as he helped many
dissidents to power in other countries.
Therefore, his conquer should have sent a
signal to other dictators that they cannot
have their way perpetually. However, this
has not been the case as many of them
believe they are invincible and stubbornly
hold on to power despite rebellion in their
homesteads.
Teodore Obiang Mbasogo
The Equatorial Guinea strongman became
the country's president in 1979 after
staging a coup that ousted Francisco Macia
Nguema. With the coming of a new
constitution in 1982, he was elected in an
election where he was the sole candidate as
president for a term of seven years and
was re-elected in 1989 also as a sole
candidate. Even after other political parties
were allowed to participate in the election,
he was re-elected in 1996, 2002 and 2009.
One of the rationales for the coup that
brought Mbasogo to power was that his
predecessor was brutal and had embarked
on genocide. Though, initially Mbasogo was
seen to be moderate, in order to have
absolute control on the state, he is also said
to have embarked on “unlawful killings
using security forces, government-
sanctioned kidnappings, systematic torture
of prisoners and detainees by security
forces, life threatening conditions in prisons
and detention facilities, impunity, arbitrary
arrest, detention, and incommunicado
detention.”

Slow death of Nigerian footballNews analysis

Black September was a phrase associated with
the terrorist incident at the 1972 Munich
Olympics. The darkest moment of the
Olympics was painted when 11 Israeli athletes
as well as a West German Policeman and
seven of the 11-man gang of the Palestinian
terrorist group were killed.
“Black October” may be an apt description of
the happenings of October 2011 in Nigerian
football. For four consecutive weekends,
Nigerian teams were battered in fixtures that
would have hitherto been mere walkovers. Even
then, the first weekend had perhaps the
bleakest independent anniversary celebrations
as it was literarily done behind closed doors,
literarily setting the tones for the next
weekends.
The elimination at home of the Super Eagles
from the 2012 African Nations Cup was
followed by a similar ousting, at home, of
Enyimba from the CAF Champions League.
Sunshine Stars also lost at home to signal
their imminent elimination from the CAF
Confederation Cup while the Super Falcons
also surrendered their claims to absolute
supremacy in the continent’s women football.
Their elimination from the All Africa Games
women football event last May has now been
followed up with another ousting from the
Olympic Games.
A miserable football season for the country
finally reached its crescendo at the weekend
with Sunshine Stars of Akure predictably
crashing out of the CAF Confederation Cup
just a day after another musical chair was
observed in the managerial arm of the Super
Eagles. Coach Samson Siasia has taken the
familiar route most of his predecessors have
had to pass through, leaving the helms of the
national team via sack, following a loss on
the pitch. The doors are now invitingly opened
for his successor who will in a short while,
suffer the same fate. It is even been suggested
that the new helmsman to be recommended
on Tuesday by the Technical Committee of
the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, and
possibly ratified the next day by the Executive
Committee, will be an interim coach.
Therefore, we have been forewarned of
another change.
So the Super Eagles, in 18 months since
January 2010, will be having their sixth coach,
making the job, one with a high turnover. For
the purpose of getting the picture clearer, the
following handled the team for the period
under reference: Amodu Shaibu (till January
2010); Dan Amokachi on interim (March
2010 in the game with Congo DR and the
WAFU Cup competition in Abeokuta); Lars
Largaback, March to June 2010; Austin
Eguavoen, August to October 2010 and
Samson Siasia November 2010 to October
2011).
Going through Niall Edworthy’s book, “The
Second Most Important Job in the Country”,
which is the story of England football
managers from 1982 to 1999, the magnitude
of the heat that Samson Siasia and the others
who have passed through the rigours on
managing the Super Eagles will be
appreciated. In one breath, you are hailed into
a position. Then comes a dramatic twist of
fate, when you are hauled out of position.
Coaching job is often seen as a thankless job.
The team takes the glory for victories; the
manager takes all the blames for setback,
which is often followed with a sack. That
explains why coaching is the most unstable of
all arrays of jobs in football business. A
former Scot player and manager, Tommy
Docherty, in the Guinness Dictionary of
Sports Quotations remarks: “There’s a hell of
politics in football. I don’t think Henry
Kissinger (a charismatic former US Secretary
of State) would have lasted 48 hours at Old
Trafford”. That explains the weight of
politics in football and in football coaching.
Reasons for sacking are sometimes very
confusing. More often than not; a coach
heralded with fanfare into position is given
the boot midway into his assignments. This is
exemplified in two of the three times that
Amodu Shaibu had been sacked from the
Super Eagles.
Sometimes it is just to satisfy ego or just for
sheer mob action, especially when the national
team lost an important match. Adegboye
Onigbinde lost his position in 1984 when he
came back from the Africa Nations Cup in
Cote d’Ivoire where the then Green Eagles were
runners-up to Cameroon. Incidentally, that
remains the best achievement by a Nigerian
coach in the African Nations Cup history.
But often, the result that triggered the sack
of a coach is a climax of accumulating
decadence in Nigerian football. The signals
of the slow, but steady decline of Nigerian
football have remained so apparent while the
administrators pretend all was well.
In the past one year for instance, Nigerian
teams only qualified for the Women World
Cup and the Under 20 World Cup, both of
which the Nigerian teams did not go far. All
the four clubs failed the continent. The
Under 17 team did not even qualify for the
continental championship, let alone making
it to the Mexico global final. The Under 20
and Under 17 women teams had qualified
before the present dispensation. Even then,
only the Under 20 women team made it to the
final match.
The domestic premier league had been
running epileptically, having one of the
longest seasons ever. A season that kicked off
amid crisis last November is already
stretching sluggishly into the 13th month.
There is nothing to suggest it will not get to
December before terminating when other
leagues are almost half way into the next
season. Little wonder, Nigerians have turned
their attention to the more entertaining
foreign leagues. No wonder, Nigerian players
who fail to get to the big leagues of Europe will
opt for the lesser ones even in war ravaged
zones of Sudan and Israel than grace the
turfs at home.
Another evidence of the comatose state of
Nigerian football is the inability of the
country to qualify for the African Nations
Championship (CHAN) which is for players
who ply their trade in local leagues of the
respective African countries. With two
editions gone, Nigeria has never qualified.
The Nigerian team was eliminated last year
by the team from Niger Republic, pointing to
the depth that the game has sunk into in
Nigeria.
It has to take the loss of the qualifying ticket
for the 2012 African Nations Cup for the
appalling standard of Nigerian football to get
attention. The national chief coach has to be
the scapegoat. It is hoped that Stephen Keshi,
who appears to be the next in line for the
Nigerian job, will be given enough time to
execute what ever programme he has.
Co-incidentally, the coach with the longest
stay has had the best result so far for Nigeria.
Clemens Westerhof guided Nigeria to 52
matches and succeeded in qualifying the
country for the World Cup for the first time
in 1993. Perhaps the story would have been
different had he been sacked in his first cap
when the loss to Cameroon also knocked
Nigeria out of the 1990 World Cup.
In his first African Nations Cup appearance,
his Super Eagles crumbled miserably 5-1 to
Algeria in the opening game of the 1990
World Cup, the biggest loss Nigeria ever
suffered in the competition in recent history.
He was left to continue and he got the team
to the final match and lost narrowly, 1-0 to
the same home team, Algeria.
Frequent changing of national team
handlers was one of the reasons FIFA chiefs
often give for Nigeria’s poor performances in
the last three World Cup finals (1998, 2002
and 2010) that Nigeria attended. Since 1991,
Wednesday’s possible announcement of a
new national team coach will be the 19th
change of guard! Nineteen appointments in
20 years paint a picture of disorganisation of
the Nigerian football.
In comparison, the countries with the best
achievements in football have had fewer turn
over of coaches. Spain, the current World Cup
holders has six coaches since 1991, while Brazil
who have won the World Cup twice within the
period under consideration, has had seven
coaches as against Nigeria’s 19 changes.
Perhaps, those are non-African countries,
hence the relative stability and consequent
successes.
Egypt is undoubtedly the most successful in
African football in the past 20 years,
winning the African Nations Cup four times,
three of which were back-to-back. Added to
that is the domination of the Egyptian clubs
in both the CAF Champions League and the
Confederation Cup competitions. Yet, the
teams were almost 100 per cent home-made.
The Egyptians, who recently appointed an
American as their national coach, have had
13 changes since 1991. Most of the coaches
have long stint. One of such is the legendary
El- Gohary who was appointed thrice on those
13 changes.
Cameroon, tottering like Nigeria, has also not
won the African Nations Cup since 2002 and
the clubs too, have long ceased to be among
the power-houses of African football. Like
Nigeria, they are big absentees at 2012
African Nations Cup. They also share the
same quality of having a high turnover of
coaches. Since 1991, Cameroon has also
appointed their 20th national team coach.
The foundation of the current state of
Nigerian football had long been laid. There is
no definite football calendar. Fixtures are
constantly altered on the excuse that there
are clubs playing continental matches as if
other African countries don’t have teams on
the same assignment. Yet, those other
countries don’t experience system failure.
Imagine what the scenario would have been if
the bulk of players for the national team were
to be drawn from the domestic league. The
Premier League would have had to be cancelled
outright. What would have been the situation,
this year for instance, if Kaduna United
and Kano Pillars had not been eliminated
early in the continental contests? The
number of outstanding matches for the
Nigerian Premier League would have been
unimaginable.
How then have the English Premiership
(that was repackaged at about the same time
Nigeria’s current experiment on professional
football began) been able to cope with the
seven clubs they have in the European
Champions League and the Europa League?
The eighth club, Birmingham, in the Europa
League, plays in the Npower Football League
Championship. Yet, apart from the
premiership and the other league, these clubs
also feature in the Carlings Cup, making their
calendar even more congested than ours.
Can’t we learn a little from how the league is
organised elsewhere and get ourselves better
organised and make Nigerian football a little
more appealing?
Beyond the disorganisation of the league, had
been the squabbles over marketing rights,
robbing the league of its live wire.
The NFF are more engrossed in a battle for
survival than marshalling plans to advance
Nigerian football. Until the right
atmosphere exists, the downward trend in
Nigerian football will go on free fall. We
don’t need to go far to search for solutions to
the ills that have been ravaging our football.
All that is needed is just go back to the shelves
where past reports are gathering dust and
having undisturbed rest. There is the Amanze
Uchegbulam Report of 1999 which deals with
the composition of the age-graded teams and
the attendant falsification of ages. The
implementation of that report would have
changed the face of Nigerian football today.
One may add: What has happened to the
Emeka Omeruah inquiry into the reasons for
our failure at the 2004 Olympics? It was
meant to provide possible ways to turn around
Nigeria’s flagging sports’ image. Sadly, such
reports that could have helped in saving the
nation the recurring pains occasioned by
constant failure are never implemented.
Before Omeruah’s one-man panel, there had
been the S.O. Williams Panel in the early
1980s. One will not be surprised if another
inquest is established to unearth the cause of
the current free fall of Nigerian football.
Yet, the solutions are in some documents
tucked in various shelves.
In 1989 when Chief Effiom Okon, who is
today the oldest living man to have been
involved in Nigerian football administration,
headed an interim administration of the then
NFA, the management committee set up an
11- point agenda to be carried out. Even
though it is doubtful if they were implemented
before the committee was shoved aside, at least
10 of the 11 points are still relevant in today’s
scenario.
The kernels of these points are hereby
reproduced:
•Examination of historical evolution of
football in Nigeria with a view to providing a
useful document for smooth football
administration. In an encounter with Chief
Effiom Okon who is now 87 years, he
affirmed that the NFA was older than what
the 1945 foundation date is suggesting.
•Working on a good package of incentives
for the locally-based footballers in order to tap
the best in them. It is a well-known fact that
the products of the domestic league have long
been made irrelevant in consideration for
national teams. Even, selection for the
Under 20 teams now extends to players
abroad.
•Drawing up of regulations to check current
and future exodus of good footballers.
Nigerian players now even feel better playing
in war zones of ?Sudan, Israel and other
lesser-known football regions.
•To draw up a five-year programme to ensure
an orderly progress in our game. This point
speaks clear for itself. We are more
concerned in participation in competitions
more than developing our sports.
•To examine the remote and immediate causes
of recent haphazard preparations for
international engagements and suggest
measures to reduce such trend.
That was a 1989 scenario which is
manifesting in 2011 because no lesson was
learnt from history.
• To draw up necessary Code of Conduct for
all footballers in order to reduce cases of
indiscipline. Perhaps, the Enyeama,
Odemwingie and Mikel Obi cases which
occurred in the course of campaign for the
2012 African Nations Cup would have been
averted.
• To suggest necessary modalities for the
setting up of standard national teams. This
way, someone who had played three seasons in
the domestic league or finished secondary
school three or four years ago will have no
business in either the Golden Eaglets or the
Flying Eagles. We know quite a large number
of them who either retired or reached their
peak before they clock 23.
• To examine various ways of enhancing the
performance of Nigerian football coaches,
including their identification, selection and
retention. The evidence of this problem is
glaring today, 22 years since it was identified
as an issue to be tackled.
• To suggest other ways and means of
enhancing the development and
modernisation of football in ?Nigeria. We
should ask ourselves, what makes the South
African and that of North African football
leagues to tick while that of Nigeria is
flagging? The comparison with other African
countries is deliberate as it will amount to
going to the extreme comparing it with the
Premiership, La Liga and that of other parts
of Europe.

Don’t fall to blackmail of ex-internationals, Chike Arisa warns NFF

WITH Nigeria Football Federation,
NFF, set to announce Samson Siasia’s
successor this week, ex-international
Chike Arisa has warned the football house
to be careful with ex-internationals
angling to take up national teams
coaching jobs.
Arisa who is based in the Netherlands is
livid that ex-internationals now see
coaching of the national team as their
birthright, their background in coaching
notwithstanding.
He fumed that people who have little or no
coaching experience are jostling to coach
the Super Eagles simply because they once
played for the national team.
“We must make it known to them that
the credentials of coaching the Super
Eagles do not include having played for
the national team. No. It does not follow
that way. Enough is enough. They have
had their fair chance and have also
bungled it. We must move beyond that”,
Arisa said on our hotline.
Apparently having followed the Samson
Siasia saga on the internet, Arisa said
that he found insulting statements
credited to some ex-internationals whom
he said flouted the proverb that says ‘’dog
does not eat dog”.
“It is only in Nigeria that ex-
internationals spoil for action because
they once played. That is not reasonable.
Anyone who wants to go into coaching
should first prove his mettle at the club
level before being assigned a massive job of
coaching our national team.
Some of us after playing for the nation
are acquiring coaching certificates and
coaching clubs while others cross their legs
looking for the plum job of coaching a
national team. It is ridiculous.
That is why our football is not growing
because those who administer it fall easily
to sentiments and blackmail by these ex-
internationals”, a highly angry Arisa
said.
Reflecting on the Siasia’s regime, Arisa
said that Siasia was better than most of
those who are lobbying to take over his job.
“Siasia, no doubt, was a good coach but he
failed because he had no training on
player-coach relationship. He couldn’t
manage that.
Thats where he got it wrong and paid the
price. If Nigeria truly wants to rebuild,
they should look for a foreign coach who
is ready to work.
There are very good foreign coaches but
the problem is that our officials corrupt
them with bogus salary only to go back to
get their own share. It’s sad to see the
Eagles and indeed football fall so badly in
a country that is as blessed as Brazil with
talents. Definitely, ex-internationals
would not lead us to the promised land”,
Arisa emphasised.

Gaddafi, son buried in secret location

The body of Libyan
ex-leader Muammer Gaddafi was buried
overnight in a secret location after days
of being put on display in a market
freezer, a Misrata military council
member said Tuesday.
The source, speaking on condition of
anonymity, said Gaddafi’s remains were
buried “overnight in a religious ceremony”
along with the corpses of his son
Mutassim and ex-defence minister Abu
Bakr Yunis Jaber.
According to guards at the entrance to
the market on the outskirts of Misrata,
215 kilometres (132 miles) east of Tripoli,
a convoy of four or five military vehicles
took away the bodies late Monday night to
an unknown location.
Three religious leaders loyal to the ousted
dictator prayed and performed a religious
ceremony before the burial, the military
council member said.
The father and two sons of the former
defence minister were present when the
bodies were picked up at the market, the
source said.
The burials come amid raging controversy
over the circumstances of Gaddafi’s death
after he was taken alive during the fall of
his hometown Sirte last Thursday.
Libya’s interim leader Mustafa Abdel Jalil
said a commission of inquiry is to probe
the strongman’s killing after foreign
governments and rights group raised
questions.
“In response to international calls, we
have started to put in place a commission
tasked with investigating the
circumstances of Muammar Gaddafi’s
death in the clash with his circle as he was
being captured,” Abdel Jalil said on
Monday.
The UN human rights office welcomed
this announcement.
Disquiet has grown internationally over
how Gaddafi met his end after National
Transitional Council (NTC) fighters
hauled him out of a culvert where he was
hiding following NATO air strikes on the
convoy in which he had been trying to flee
his falling hometown.
Mobile phone videos show him still alive at
that point.
The corpses of Gaddafi — with a bullet
wound to the head — his son Mutassim,
and decades-long confidant Abubakr
Yunes had laid in a meat market freezer
on the outskirts of the city of Misrata
until Monday.
Libya’s interim prime minister Mahmud
Jibril said in Jordan on Sunday that an
autopsy report showed Gaddafi was killed
in “crossfire from both sides.”
Since Friday, thousands of ordinary
Libyans have viewed the bodies of the slain
men, many taking pictures on their
mobile phone.
Meanwhile a fuel tank exploded in Sirte
late on Monday killing more than 100
people, NTC military commander Leith
Mohammed said.
“There was an enormous explosion and a
huge fire. More than 100 people were killed
and 50 others wounded” Mohammed told
AFP in Tripoli.
He said the scene was “a heart wrenching
spectacle with dozens of charred bodies.”
The accidental explosion happened as a
crowd of people waited near the fuel tank
to fill up their cars.