NFF president, Amaju Pinnick
THE President of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Amaju Pinnick, has said the nomination of Gabonese striker, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, as the African Footballer of the Year, is a clear indication that the continent’s football has come of age.
Pinnick, who disclosed this to The Guardian, noted that the prolific Borussia Dortmund forward shocked the continent by becoming the first player from the central Africa to win the award.
“African football has come of age, look at Aubameyang, who could ever dreamt that a Gabonese player would win the African Footballer of the Year.
“If you look at it, you could see that it was fairly and justly done. Amongst those three players, anyone could have won it. I am just trying to tell you that football has come of age in Africa; football doesn’t wait for anybody.
“Shortly after the likes of Victor Osimhen and Etebo Oghenetaro won the youth player of the year and the most promising talent player of the year award respectively in the just concluded prestigious GLO- CAF award revealed that the best of the federation’s youth programme is yet to come.”
The NFF’s president, who was full of praises for the youth programme embarked upon by the federation in the last one year, said the award won by the two young Nigerians no doubt gave credence to NFF’s comprehensive youth development programme.
According to him, “we are very happy for the young lads and I am not surprise because this gives credence to our comprehensive youth development programme.
“We are very thankful, if Nigeria can win two out of the 12 awards in Africa, I think we have not done badly.
Don’t forget, we have 52 nations in Africa and if we can win two out of 12 awards, I don’t think is bad and those two are the players for the future, which can go ahead and win Africa footballer of the year. So, we give kudos to our youth programme and I want to assure Nigerians that the best of those youth programme are yet to come.”
Pinnick, who is optimistic that come 2016 Nigeria will emerge as Africa footballer of the year, said: “And I can say it here that in the next award, I see the likes of Odion Ighalo, and other Nigerians been nominated and winning some awards.”
