Football: Afcon 2019 - Nigeria faces Fifa ban, may not play against Seychelles in AFCON qualifiers |04 July 2018

The Africa Cup of Nations (Afcon) 2019 qualifiers home match against the Super Eagles of Nigeria had been originally scheduled for March 23, 2018. It was however rescheduled for October, after the Confederation of African Football (Caf) approved the request made by the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) to move the encounter, permitting the Western African giants to complete their preparations for the 2018 FIFA World Cup finals in Russia.

The Seychelles National Team may now not have to meet the three times African champions, just as the two other sides drawn in Group D of the qualifying stage - Libya and South Africa. The most highly populated African nation of nearly 200 million people who have just bowed out of the World Cup after two first round defeats (0-2 to Croatia, 1-2 to Argentina) and a single win (2-0 over Iceland) now face another major disappointment: the prospect of being imposed a lengthy ban from all competitions by the world’s football governing body Fifa.

This follows the intervention of the Nigerian Sports Minister Solomon Dalung over who should become the NFF’s new chairman, following a row between two contenders – Chris Giwa and Amaju Pinnick - for the esteemed post. The case seemed to have been settled by the Court of Sports Arbitration in Switzerland which had ruled in Pinnick’s favour, while the Nigerian Supreme Court and Federal High Court had decided otherwise. Fifa has on its side maintained that the matter has been decided by the highest Court of Sports Arbitration.

“Fifa is only bound by the decision of the Court of Arbitration for Sports and does not entertain or tolerate decisions by local courts in footballing nations worldwide. Hence, Fifa has since upheld the decision of the Court of Arbitration on this matter and recognised the NFF board led by Amaju Pinnick.

Nigeria has a duty to comply with that decision. In addition, for the indiscretion of those individuals like Chris Giwa to approach the local courts, FIFA has since imposed a worldwide ban on them from all footballing activities,” a spokesman for Pinnick has declared.

A total of 24 teams will qualify to play in the finals of Afcon 2019, including Cameroun who qualified automatically as hosts. Seychelles currently lie at the bottom of Group D after having already lost their first match on a 5-1 score in Libya. Nigeria, three-time Afcon winners who have missed out on the last two editions of the competition, have also lost 2-0 against South Africa.

Should Nigeria be compelled to quit the qualifiers, the remaining fixtures for Seychelles will be: South Africa (home and away) and Libya (home).

The dates retained by Caf for the matches are as follows: 3-11 September 2018, 8 – 16 October 2018, 12 – 20 November 2018 and 18 – 26 March 2019.