Last week, the Kano state Football Association
(FA), called on all local government councils in the state to come forward
for the registeration of 2005 inter-local government soccer competition
called Governor Shekarau Cup.
according to the secretary of the state FA,
Alhaji Auwalu Musa Zakirai, the registration will begin from December 8 and
last for two weeks only. He warned that late entries would not be
entertained and added that the registration fee is N30,000 while that of
license is N7,000.
The secretary then unfolded the commitment of
the association towards ensuring a well-organised tournament in the state
and appealed to all local government chairmen to assist them towards the
crisis free championship for the upliftment of sports, especially football
in the state.
Let me start by congratulating Kano FA for the
step taken to bring back the inter-local government soccer competition in
the state at the same time regretting the way and manner the FA wants
re-introduce the competition.
Instead of the secretariat to come up with a
new design on how to make the championship different from the previous
competition, the FA seems to be talking something else. We all know how the
use of mercenaries, bribe and all sort of curruptions marred the previous
championships. I expect the FA to tell us how they want to tackle these
problems but all they are more interested in is the registration fees which
to me is too much. The amount is too much and can scare most LGs from
registering for the competition. They should know that the main aim of this
type of competition is to develop the game and unearth the abundant hidden
talents in the local governments.
The secretariat needs to first of all build
confidence in all the LGs so that they can see the FA as an impartial umpire
since what killed and halted the previous competitions are favouritism,
partiality and absence of good coordination.
The secretariat needs to tell us what its plan
is and how it wants to organise the 2005 competition so that it can be
different from succesive ones as we know that some of the previous
competitions are yet to be concluded.
The secretariat also needs to assure us the style it want to
employ during the 2005 competition; is it zonal or otherwise and what it has
for bad officials and officiating officials. This is due to the fact these
two were the pricipal culprits who normally make the competition
unattaractive and unorganised.
