The season before the current 2023/24 NPFL campaign was a short one that ended with the Super-6 playoff at the Mobolaji Johnson Sports Centre in Lagos.
Perhaps the way it was played, with a temporary management committee, all attention on the league with a new management, and of course the referees being paid their allowances made things work seemingly well.
And then the final-6 event Lagos was on international television and every game was played at one centre which ultimately made regular fans unofficial referee assessors at the venue for each game.
The referees were aware that the games were being played live on TV; they were aware of the daily reviews of their performance and activities by the thousands of fans that they had no choice but to behave in very responsible ways.
One underlying fact, though, is that the refs and officials who had major roles especially towards the end of the regular season and during the playoff were “carefully” selected.
The referees regarded as having very tainted records were left out of the games. This explains why media reports were more on the players, teams and the matches than on the men we grew up knowing as men in black.
Super-6 and Naija Super-8 playoffs
At the same period in 2023 was the inaugural edition of the Naija Super-8 – a privately organized pre-season event that showcased eight Nigerian teams that qualified via the votes of football fans.
The organizers gave the referees and other match officials the best treatment so far received in the history of the game in the country, and they responded to the good treatment by being very firm and focused in their decisions.
There were times referees decisions were questioned during both playoffs but many followers of the game, especially those who were at the stadium, waved them off as human errors. The competitions were thus reviewed positively as the negatives were quite insignificant.
Nigerian referees: Pay-as-you-go era
The playoffs season may have been called good time but there was an ugly era before this period. This was the ugly period were a good team would go through the eye-of-the-needle to win a match away from their base even when they were as much as ten times better than their opponents.
A major factor that shaped this period was the money in the pockets of the clubs officials.
We had what can be described as horror seasons under the immediate past board of the League Management Board.
During this period, the referees were not paid their allowances. They travelled distances from their homes to run games without being paid. There was no money paid and no insurance cover for these referees who were also expected to be fair to all sides.
What was shocking was that the teams in the league continued to play and these men travelled all over the country taking the bills for national assignments along with the demands of parenthood and nobody raised the alarm to stop the league.
How could they have been travelling round the country without pay? The answer was glaring.
The clubs took care of them unofficially until it was made official. There is an old team that had very huge budgets and everyone was somehow aware of it.
In those periods they dominated the league and their coach easily became a part of the Super Eagles coaching crew. The season the referees were heavily organized and monitored, they dropped to the lower league. The other clubs who also had huge budgets could not be left out of taking “good care” of the referees and they had control of the game.
Matches without television
These clubs were aided by the fact that the matches were no longer on TV. Even when it was on TV, clubs and their referees cheated, but then taking the games out of direct public view and scrutiny made it even worse.
Moreover, the referees and their conniving club officials held sway. A change with a new board and better payment and scrutiny of the referees improved the level of officiating through the 2022/23 season.
Fans were hoping for a better 2023/2024 season but referees have come into the full view again in the leagues as it has become a situation of one week, one ugly incident.
What is happening in the Nigeria Professional Football League is softer compared to what is happening in the lower leagues. The NPFL has closer watch and compliance check with the more resources available to the management of the league but still referees have found ways to shock the world.
Lower leagues and stiffer penalties
The referees at the lower league have taken the game to disrepute more than we had ever seen in recent past seasons. Barely a fortnight ago, a player scored a goal like a volleyball player blocking a spike by the net while a referee stood just a few metres watching.
The goal was recorded to the dismay of the whole world but the referee stood his ground claiming he accepted the goal for purely safety reasons as there were very serious threats to his life if he disallowed it. Interestingly, the following week there was another in the same lower league.
The referees are up again, but what has made things different this season compared to the old season is that both the NPFL and the National League have management teams that have found ways of responding to irregularities from the referees and the clubs they are conniving with to cheat and bring the competition to disrepute.
Despite the speedy reactions and stiffer punishments, the resurgent negative attitudes of some of the referees can hardly help market the leagues.
Marketing and sponsorship hindrance
There is no league in Nigeria whether played by the men or ladies that has full sponsorship. Just as the refs do some magic with the men’s games, a lot is also happening with the women’s event concerning poor officiating.
A decade ago, this was not the story as the leagues had sponsors. The downturn of the Nigerian economy, coupled with the poor management of the country’s football discouraged likely sponsors.
The long drawn battle over the football federation board leading up to FIFA’s intervention did not help marketing the major league. However, current managers of the NPFL, as well as the NFF are battling to secure major sponsorship deals.
What the football authorities in Nigeria have always done is to punish individual referees and impose blanket sanctions on the clubs. One thing that could change the situation and straighten out every official is when the club officials, as well as others who offer inducement to the referees are singled out and treated as accessories to corruption.
This way, the cleaning process would get the country’s fraud units involved. When jail terms are involved, no matter how short, individuals would sit up and make Nigerian leagues better.
