Former President of the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF), Amaju Pinnick, has urged new methods of maintaining sports infrastructure in Nigeria.Pinnick made this call on Tuesday while delivering this year’s personality guest lecture of the Faculty of Education, University of Ibadan (UI).The former NFF president said that plenteous and well-maintained sport infrastructure were crucial for Nigeria’s success in international competitions, calling for a re-dedication to the ethos of maintenance in the country.“Poor sport infrastructure has the consequence of limited talent development, reduces competitiveness, is a major disincentive to athletes, makes it impossible for any nation to host competitions, and has a negative impact on a country’s pride and sense of identity,” Pinnick said, in his paper titled, The Challenges of Sports Infrastructure and Maintenance in Nigeria: Prospect for the Podium Performance.Pinnick said in order to ensure a positive turn-around, there is the need for public-private partnerships in infrastructural development and maintenance, innovative funding models, and adopting modern maintenance technologies.He also spoke about capacity-enhancement for maintenance experts and a cluster-model that will rank each state of the federation, according to sport infrastructure available in their domain and also engender stiff competition among them for infrastructural sufficiency.“There are a few success stories on the African continent, such as South Africa and Morocco, who have a national sports maintenance agency.
We do not necessarily need to copy them; we can develop what will work for us. What is important now is that we must confront this sport infrastructural deficit head-on and the Federal