Football Legend Pele set to visit Nigeria in August

Football’s greatest legend, Brazilian World Cup winner Pele is expected in Nigeria for a historic visit in August as part of events planned by the Winihin Jemide Series and Youth Experience Days Africa.

Born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, the three-time World Cup winner will headline a youth football tournament that will take place at the Astro-Turf in Ikoyi as well as a leadership meeting with Corporate Nigeria.

Famous for scoring 1,281 goals during his career, Pele won the first of his three World Cups as a 17-year-old at Sweden ’58 before adding two more titles at Chile ’62 and Mexico ’70.

The WJS/YEDA Legend Edition 2016 is a 2-day event (11th -12th August, 2016) focused on youth development and empowerment through a once-in-a-lifetime inspiring experience with Pele.

The event will involve football loving teenagers and parents, key figures from various state governments, the corporate sector and the Nigeria Football Federation. The event will include a sports clinic (Legend tournament), a Gala Night with Pele and other African football legends.

It will also include an auction of Pele memorabilia at the Gala night with proceeds from the auction expected to be donated to an eligible local youth football academy.

Pele has received an honorary knighthood from Britain's Queen Elizabeth II and was named "Athlete of the Century” and "Player of the Century” by the International Olympic Committee and Fifa respectively, amongst many other accolades.

This will be Pele’s second visit to Nigeria; the first in 1967, was occasioned by a 2-day cease fire during the Nigerian Civil War which allowed the warring sides to watch the Pele & Santos FC team play an exhibition match in Lagos.

Fans can register for the visit via the official website.

Goal

Video - Brexit and Nigeria

It's close to three weeks now since Britain voted to leave the EU and the impact of that decision is still evident worldwide. In Nigeria, investors and market analysts are still dissecting how the referendum could affect its economy -- and how to deal with any possible negative fallout. Here is CCTV's Deji's Badmus with more on that.

CNN to build multi-platform bureau in Lagos, Nigeria

The Cable News Network (CNN), an American basic cable and satellite television channel has announced the launch of a new, multi-platform operation in Lagos, Nigeria, designed to give the network a nimble, broad-based, Digital-first presence in Africa’s most populous country.

Leading the operation will be Stephanie Busari, who takes on the role of Supervising Producer, Africa. Busari will work across CNN’s newsgathering and digital operations, and will be the network’s first responder for all platforms.

Deborah Rayner, SVP, Newsgathering at CNN International, said: “This is a truly integrated role, and one that underlines CNN’s commitment to both Nigeria and Africa as a whole. Stephanie will work across our platforms on both news and feature content. In particular, she will head CNN’s Africa content across digital – responding to breaking news and managing our Africa features projects. She will also be central to the CNN International’s coverage of the continent on television.”

Speaking on her new role, Busari observes that “To return to Nigeria at such an important time in the country’s history is a proud and exciting moment for me. This is such a vibrant country, full of possibilities, and as well as my broader remit, looking at Africa as a whole this role will be about putting the many sides of Nigeria itself into sharper relief for the world.”

Since joining CNN in 2008, Busari has worked across some of the network’s most important African stories. In particular ,she was central to CNN’s coverage of the Missing Chibok girls, working alongside Senior International Correspondent Nima Elbagir.

A multi-award winning journalist, Busari began her career at the now-defunct London-based newspaper New Nation, which was aimed at the UK’s black and ethnic minority communities. She then moved to the UK’s Daily Mirror, where, among other beats she covered Northern Ireland, reporting on some of the worst affected areas of “The Troubles”.

While in Belfast she also launched and edited an award-winning lifestyle column for the paper. A native Yoruba speaker, she also speaks fluent French.

The Nation

Nigeria FIFA rankings fall yet again

Mixed reactions have trailed the latest world football governing body, FIFA’s rating of countries announced yesterday.

The Assistant Technical Director of Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Coach Shiju Lagunju who spoke with Daily Trust said though FIFA uses verifiable indices to rate countries, the rating is of no effect on the performance of the teams.

“I don’t believe in it [the ranking], it doesn’t show the quality of our game,” he said.

“Does it really matter that Belgium, ranked 2nd was beaten by Wales? Does it really matter that Spain, ranked 8th was defeated by Italy or Brazil who are in the top ten, unable to make the knock out stage of COPA America?”

He insisted that one can only ascertain the strength of a team when the chips are down, expressing optimism that Nigeria will bounce back as the rebuilding process will soon start yielding results.

On his part, Head coach of the Nigeria Professional Football League side, Warri Wolves Mansur Abdullahi said Nigeria’s ranking was unfortunate, nothing that “It shows that Eagles are not improving.”

Also, the Chairman of the FCT chapter of Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN), Kayode Adeniyi who expressed dismay over the ranking, said it was being anticipated since the team did not play any match in recent times.

“What the stakeholders have been doing is to fight among themselves. Until we get our act together, we will continue to go down in subsequent rankings,” he submitted.

Similarly, a sports analyst Karlos Aondoaver Tsokar blamed the country’s current position on the inconsistency of the team.

“We have been very inconsistent in our performance in all international competitions. Without a coach for a while and those that we have managed to place in acting positions have not been able to properly assemble a team that would play with the passion, strength and agility our Super Eagles were known for.

“At a point, we were the most entertaining team in Africa, such that even if the results were abysmal as it is now, we were still rated well. But now it is different,” he lamented.

Another sports pundit, Modupe Oyewale expressed optimism that the team will bounce back, stressing that “We can only hope that things get better and that the Super Eagles bounce back to winning ways so that our ranking position can improve.”

Nigeria, yesterday dropped nine places in the latest world football governing body (FIFA)’s rating.

The Super Eagles were ranked 61st in June’s rating but have now dropped to be ranked 16th best team in Africa and 70th in the world.

Algeria, one of Nigeria’s 2018 World Cup qualifiers opponents with 781 points, are the highest ranked team on the continent and 32nd in the world.

Cote d’Ivoire (35), Ghana (36), Senegal (41) and Egypt (43) completes the top five teams in Africa in that order.

Others in the top ten are: Tunisia (45), Cameroon (53), Morocco (54), Congo DR (59) and Mali (61) who occupied the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th positions respectively.

On the global stage, Euro 2016 surprise package Iceland rise to their highest ranking after reaching the quarter-finals of Euro 2016, moving up 12 places to 22nd.

The top five teams remained the same, with Argentina ranked first ahead of Belgium, Colombia, Germany and Chile.

Euro 2016 winners Portugal and defeated finalists France moved up two and 10 places respectively to sit sixth and seventh, with Spain, Brazil and Italy rounding off the top 10.

Daily Trust

Militants blow up gas pipeline in southwest Nigeria

A gas pipeline operated by Nigeria's state energy company in southwestern Ogun state has been attacked by men disguised as maintenance staff, local police said on Thursday.

Attacks by militants on oil and gas facilities in the Niger Delta region - in the south and southeast - over the last few months briefly pushed crude production in the OPEC member to 30-year lows in the spring.

But facilities in the southwest region, which is not part of the Delta area, have so far not been targeted. Militant groups have called for a greater share of Nigeria's oil and gas wealth to go to the Delta, which is the country's main energy hub.

Muyiwa Adejobi, a spokesman for Ogun state police said the attack took place on Tuesday night in the town of Ogijo.

"We were told that some guys came in two vehicles dressed as officials in charge of repairs and maintenance of the gas pipelines and then used dynamite to blow up the gas line belonging to a subsidiary of (state energy firm) NNPC," he said.

"Unfortunately one of the lines was damaged. There are other lines that were not affected," he added.

The pipeline supplies the commercial capital Lagos, which is around 80km (50 miles) from Ogun state, and other parts of the southwest.

Adejobi said there were "insinuations that militants could be responsible" but added that police "are not jumping to conclusions yet as to which group was responsible". Nobody has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Reuters