At an interactive session with Journalists in Ilorin for the University of Ilorin 21km Marathon Race, the Director General of the National Sports Commission (NSC), Mallam Alhassan Yakmut, offered words of commendation to the leadership of the League Management Company (LMC) which is led by Mallam Shehu Dikko for the improvements in the domestic league, the Nigeria Professional Football League.
According to Mr. Alloy Chukwuemeka, the Acting Secretary of the Club Owners and Managers Association, the NSC DG said that the LMC has brought and engendered some positive strides to the league and as also brought sanity to the management of the football league in the country.
Yakmut spoke on Tuesday on a wide range of issues on the development of sports in Nigeria and maintained that the LMC had taken the players welfare seriously, they have also reduced the desperation of teams seeking to win the league at all cost.
He was quoted as saying, “I am very jealous of the Nigeria Professional Football League under Shehu Dikko because they have broken some of my records”
“I can see the determination for innovation, I can see the determination to confront elements that are trying to set the clock of development of the League backward”
“I think generally the NPFL is on the right path of development” Yakmut concluded.
Yakut was once an Executive Secretary of the defunct Nigeria Premier league (NPL) and he was of the view that what needs to be addressed towards perfecting the league structure is the matter of government’s involvement in club ownership. He suggested that state governments who own clubs should be considering divesting and involve individuals and corporate organizations through subscription.
“We must commercialise our clubs such that government can only own some stake or buy shares into teams but not full ownership of it. Until this is done, our clubs will continue to be an extension of public agency” Yakmut argued.
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