NFF Slashes Keshi's Salary by Half!

The Nigerian Football Federation has come out to announce a cut in the salary of the National Team coach Stephen Keshi, by a whooping 50%!

The announcement was contained in a statement released by the technical committee on Wednesday, citing financial difficulty as reason necessitating the move.

It also announced a slash in salaries, allowances and bonuses of players and coaches in all cadres of the national teams in the country.

An initial win bonus of $10,000 has been withered down to $5,000, while the African Nations Cup winning coach, Keshi, will have his salary of N5 million slashed down to N2.5 million ($16,000), all in a bid to cut expenditures.

That's not all. . . .

Backroom staff, and assistant coaches have been fired. They are:

Sylvanus Okpala (Assistant Coach), Anderson Elderson (video analyst), Robinson Okosun (Team Psychologist), Emmanuel Attah (Team Coordinator), Gideon Akinsola (Team Security Officer), and Ben Alaya (Media Officer), who is to be replaced by Demola Olajire.

The Federation also reduced the backroom staff of the other national teams, the Flying Eagles and the Golden Eaglets to 7 from 17.

"Based on the parlous financial situation that the Nigeria Football Federation currently finds itself, the committee has also recommended the staff auditing of the technical crew and backroom staff of all the national teams" the statement said.

According to a top official of the NFF, at least half of their annual budget was spent on the recent Nations Cup in South Africa signalling the beginning of the federation’s financial woes forcing it to seek drastic solutions to keep the federation alive till the end of the year.

Is this a fallout of all the largesse Keshi and his team received as a result of their success at the AFCON 2013?

We all know that the NFF is cash strapped. . . They've always been. . . However, coming out now to announce these drastic measures causes more than a few eyebrows to go up.

Just hope these measures will help them function more effectively. . .

. . . Though it's probably safe to bet they won't.