AFWCON: Nigeria Risks Losing Hosting Rights Over Poor Facilities – Dare

• Equatorial Guinea gaining grounds
• MKO Stadium Abuja, National Stadium Lagos for concession

BY COBHAM NSA, ABUJA – The age long ailment of poor maintenance culture and dilapidated sporting infrastructure across the country may see Nigeria losing her bid to host the prestigious African Women Africa Cup of Nation (AFWCON) later this year.

Minister of Youth and Sports Development, Sunday Dare, who dropped the hints in Abuja, says the country is on the verge of being knocked out of contention by Equatorial Guinea due to lack of stadium infrastructure to host the continental tournament.

He also said Nigeria would have comfortably hosted the FIFA under 20 Women World Cup, but sadly lost out because it has only one standard FIFA football pitch in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State that may even be out of serious reckoning in the next eight months.

Mr Dare spoke on Tuesday during a meeting with the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) on the Concession-Commercialization plan for the Moshood Abiola (MKO) Stadium, Abuja and the National Stadium Surulere, Lagos.

According to him, “We would have hosted the under 20 FIFA World Cup, we were not given because we have just one standard football FIFA pitch in Uyo which will go out of reckoning in another eight months and out of the eleven practice pitch needed, we have just two and the indoor sports hall only one is functioning across the country so it’s a question of structural rationalization.

“The Women Africa Cup of Nation is November this year, Nigeria and Equatorial Guinea are the last two candidates and Equatorial Guinea looks likely to take it, why? Because we don’t have infrastructure.”

He however said as part of Federal Government’s efforts to revamp sporting facilities across the country, the MKO Stadium in Abuja and the National Stadium in Surulere, Lagos have been selected for concession commercialization.

The Minister explained that government’s bold step is informed by its desires to see through the pilot phase successfully before moving to concession other stadiums in the country, adding that the Ministry and the government are aiming to turn the various stadia into muster points for youth development; revenue generating assets; and centres of development in the country.

Dare, who identified inadequate funding as the root cause of poor stadium facilities over the years, noted that after building the Abuja National Stadium, the contractors, Julius Berger presented a bill of N1.2 billion for annual maintenance, an amount which the ministry and government couldn’t afford, leading to current unhealthy state of affairs within the edifice

“The Abuja National stadium is very particular. We had professionals fixing the grass; now we have started bringing in labourers to use cutlass and hoe to clear the grass. We also started an adoption programme to bring about some level of activities at the Abuja Stadium. We have Aliko Dangote investing $1 billion to bring the stadiums back to world standard. Work has started all over the place, while Baba-Ijebu is willing to invest half a billion naira into the National stadium.”

Giving highlights of the meeting outcome, the Minister said it was continuing a process that started about six month ago aimed at accelerating the concession of National Stadium Surulere and the MKO Stadium Abuja.

He described BPE as a critical partner along the ICRC, saying; “We have been having conversation. We have reached the point we need to put together the bid documents so that we can have the private funds for sport development. We have also restarted that process because we witnessed a lot sometimes in November. There is a new commitment to have holistic approach, such that we can use both the National Stadium Surulere and Moshood Abiola Stadium Abuja as pilot stadia for full commercialization.

“We are going to do this looking at global bench marking and acceptable standards. The template of course is global; I don’t think it’s going to be different when it comes to Nigeria. We are working on the assignment of roads; looking at timelines; and I think and I must say that the government of Nigeria and the Ministry are really interested in making sure this project is accelerated and completed on schedule.”

The Minister expressed hopes that within the next 10-16month, the country can have the two national monument fully active in the hands of private sector operators with government only holding a legal right to them.

In his remarks, Director General of BPE, Mr. Alex Okoh, said the Stadia listed for reforms by way of concession include; National Stadium Lagos, Liberty Stadium Ibadan, Ahmadu Bello Stadium Kaduna, Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium Enugu, MKO Abiola Stadium Abuja and Tafawa Balewa Stadium Bauchi.

He said; “Under the leadership of the Minister of Sport, we are basically re-setting the arrangements to ensure we are able to deliver on the process, through which we will attract private capital for the development of these two key pilot stadiums, that of Abuja and Lagos before the end of this year hopefully.”

Okoh further stated; “We are very optimistic that this particular process will succeed; we have all the elements in place to ensure we are able to do that in a very timely manner. And with the political will, we are beginning to see now into this process. Certainly, the public should be optimistic that we will complete this process in a very timely manner.

Admitting that there are some challenges in implementing the reforms over a period of time, the BPE boss said the current management is making a case for commercialization by concession and the whole idea aims at moving the stadiums from the fiscal burden that it place on the budgetary allocation of the Ministry to a private sector arrangement

“We are looking at being able to attract private capital to the development of critical infrastructure in the stadiums and of course, generating pre-requisite revenue to compensate that investments”, Mr Okoh said