Good People, join me to congratulate the new Super Eagles coach, Eric Sekou Chelle. Sure, I do not know a lot about his coaching credentials, but I am just happy that Nigeria expanded its searchlight beyond the shores of Nigeria and Europe, for a new coach. Coach Chelle is a Malian national and I am excited about that promise.
The recent appointment of Eric Sekou Chelle, a Malian national, as the new coach of Nigeria’s Super Eagles has sparked a wide array of reactions from football fans, pundits, and critics alike. While some supporters welcome the decision with optimism, others express skepticism over the credentials of the new coach, alongside concerns about the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) and the performance of local coaches. This piece explores the various reactions and the key themes emerging from the discussion on Facebook and YouTube, surrounding Chelle’s appointment.
Get me: my junior secondary school Mathematics teacher had an unusual name for a secondary school in the heart of the Igbo Nation: Bukar. As teenagers, Bukar mobilized us to like Mathematics in Junior secondary. He opened a club, Bukar for Math. When we moved to the senior secondary, we requested for Further Mathematics because we felt the General Mathematics was boring.
My village, Ovim, had a tradition of recruiting brilliant people for the public school, paying them out of whatever the government was doing. Today, I am not sure Bukar will have a chance because his name possibly will disqualify him. That is the state of Nigeria as we have regionalized appointment of vice chancellors, and critical elements of our knowledge systems. Yes, these days, the host communities want to produce the vice chancellors of some universities, with no regard to excellence and capabilities!
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So, for the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) to do this, I am hoping we are having a reset. Rwanda has done this in Africa very well. When we were setting up Carnegie Mellon University in Kigali, Profs Ogwu, Egiebor and other Nigerians were leading some other core tertiary institutions there. In other words, Rwanda goes for the best it can find across Africa, and that has provided competitiveness for the nation.
Can we extend what NFF has done to how we recruit in our polytechnics at least? The instructors in Mali, Niger Republic, etc who train those expert tilers, plumbers, painters, etc we cherish in Nigeria, can we bring them to Nigeria to help train our young people in polytechnics, and leave “state of origin” out for a season? In the ranking of vocational schools in Africa, I am not sure Nigeria has any school in the top 50, and that means we can execute the Coach Chelle hiring model in that critical domain.
The last line: Coach Chelle must still deliver GOLDs for Super Eagles. That is not negotiable, and I am by no means discounting the necessity of that outcome.
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