By Emma Njoku
Veteran coach, Bernard Ogbeh, and 21 others, including coaches and players, have cried out over non payment of their outstanding salaries, sign on fees and match bonuses by the management of Akwa United Football Club of Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, seven years after the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) ruled in their favour on the matter.
The coaches and players had petitioned the Players’ Status/Arbitration Committee of the NFF, sometime in June 2015, to prevail on the reigning Nigeria Premier League (NPL) champions to pay them over N47 million being outstanding financial entitlements due to them at the time they parted ways with the club. Speaking on behalf of himself and 21 others, coach Ogbeh, who joined Akwa United as technical adviser/head coach midway into the 2009/2010 league season, and left the club at the end of the 2010/2011 season, said having waited in vain for the payment of their outstanding financial entitlements more than four years after they parted ways with the club, they had no option than to take their case(s) to the Players’ Status/Arbitration Committee in a joint petition.
Supporting their claims with various letters written by the players’ status/arbitration committee of the NFF to the management of Akwa United FC, Coach Ogbeh, who spoke on behalf of the rest, said officials of the club did not honour two invitations by the committee, neither have they paid him and the other coaches and players their various claims amounting to N47, 050, 000.00 (Forty-seven million and fifty thousand naira), as directed by the committee.
The first invitation letter from the committee with reference number: NFF/LEG/230/106, dated June 23, 2015, and signed by the Secretary Players’ Status/Arbitration Committee, Nasiru Jubril, was addressed to the Secretary, Akwa United FC, Uyo, and copied to Akwa Ibom State Football Association and the League Management Company Limited (LMC), inviting the Hon. Isong Isang-led management of Akwa United FC to a meeting on April 15, 2015, but they failed to honour the invitation.
The committee also invited the club to its meeting on June 15, 2015, and, again, they failed to show up, prompting the committee to order the club to pay the coaches and players their various claims amounting to N47, 050, 000.00 on or before June 30, 2015, failure of which the team would be banned from transferring or buying players during the transfer windows.
At the expiration of the June 30, 2015 deadline for payment of the outstanding entitlements to the coaches and players, the NFF committee went ahead to ban the club from transfer of players (buying and selling), both locally and internationally.
The ban, which was contained in the committee’s letter to Akwa United FC after its meeting on September 18, 2015, also mandated the League Management Company (LMC) “not to register the club for the 2015/2016 league season until they liquidate their indebtedness to the players and coaches concerned.”
However, both sanctions were never enforced by the LMC as Akwa United FC has not only continued to participate in the domestic league but, also, buys and sells players, both locally and internationally, during transfer windows till date.
Ogbeh further claimed that after Hon. Isong Isang exited as chairman of Akwa United FC, he approached the incumbent Chairman of the club and Senior Special Assistant to Governor Emmanuel Udom on Sports Matters, Mr. Paul Bassey, on the issue more than four years ago, but nothing has happened since then.
“I mentioned the matter to Paul Bassey when Akwa United came to Jos for a league match, either in 2016 or 2017, and he told me that the previous management did not hand over any such liability to him.
“Regardless, he asked me to make a formal complaint in writing to the current management of the club, which I did and dispatched through courier services and the courier firm showed me evidence of delivery. I followed up with text messages which he received, but till date he did not respond to my messages. I still have evidence of the text messages I sent to him,” Ogbeh said.
The 2000 FA Cup winning coach and his colleagues are appealing to the Akwa Ibom State governor, Emmanuel Udom, the NFF and LMC to do something urgently, to ensure that their claims are paid without further delay.
“This matter has lingered for a very long time. We worked for the money in question, so we deserve to be paid because a labourer, they say, deserves his wages. One is surprised that even the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) and the League Management Committee (LMC) cannot enforce their own rules and sanctions. I’m appealing to the Akwa Ibom State governor to do something fast because some of the players involved are threatening to resort to self help to recover their money. People should understand that we are bread winners of our respective families,” Ogbeh concluded.