By Akeem Oyetunji
Barely 48 hours after he took to his Twitter handle to lament Nigeria’s ouster from the 2017 African Cup of Nations, Afcon, Youth and Sports Minister, Solomon Dalung, appears to have retraced his steps.
Dalung had called on the board of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) led by Amaju Pinnick, to give way after the Super Eagles lost to the Pharaohs in Alexandria, Egypt on Tuesday.
“Nigerians cannot accept any reason for failure from anybody so we either deliver or we give way to those who can deliver success.
“After this abysmal performance at AFCON qualifiers it’s important we return to the drawing board to plan the future of football in Nigeria.
“We have no good reason not to qualify if we had planned well and also organise ourselves rather it was crisis all the way rocking NFF,” the Minister had said on his Twitter.
The comments were considered hasty by some sports pundits who opined that Mr. Dalung should have waited to be briefed by the leadership of the NFF before making attempt to dissolve an elected NFF board.
But addressing newsmen in Abuja on Friday, Dalung, said he would not force Pinnick and his Board members to resign.
He also said he would not be recruited as a machinery to destabilize a constituted NFF body.
His words, “I implement laws based on facts on ground, I cannot use social media gossips as a basis.
“Except you people are saying that I should resign, and then I will ask for Amaju Pinnick and his board to quit.
“I cannot force him to resign. It is left for him to decide whether he will resign or not, and not asking me to tell him to resign.
“It is unfortunate not to qualify for AFCON 2017, but I believe we have learnt from our mistakes and hope that such would not repeat itself again.
“It is true that we need to review some of the country`s football structure. We have to measure up to expectations.
“We are meeting with the leadership of the NFF on Tuesday, to receive a comprehensive report and review the authentic technical reports they would present”.
