Former Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) president Amaju Pinnick has dismissed any possibility of returning to the helm of Nigerian football.
Speaking during an interview with News Central TV in Morocco, Pinnick said that while age and experience remain on his side, the desire to lead the federation again is no longer there.
“I’m young. I’m 55. I can still be an NFF president. But do I want to be? Never,” he said.
Pinnick served as NFF president from 2014 to 2022, completing two full terms that coincided with a period of significant international exposure for Nigerian football administrators.
Beyond his domestic role, he also functioned as First Vice President of CAF and sat on the organising committee of FIFA competitions.
Looking back on his eight-year tenure, Pinnick struck a reflective note, expressing contentment with what he achieved while acknowledging that the federation must continue to evolve.
“I’ve done eight years and I’m okay with it. So it’s moving forward. It’s helping the federation, seeing some of their inadequacies and seeing how to make it adequate,” he said.
His stance comes four years after a turbulent phase marked by legal disputes and political wrangling over the NFF’s electoral process. That period eventually ended with the election of Ibrahim Gusau, the Zamfara FA chairman, as the 40th president of the NFF at the body’s 78th elective congress in 2022.
Before stepping aside, Pinnick had maintained that he was “eligible to run for a third term” based on his reading of NFF statutes. That interpretation, however, drew strong opposition from key figures within Nigerian sports administration.
Former Minister of Sports Solomon Dalung was among the most vocal critics, repeatedly arguing that leadership tenures should be capped in line with the Nigerian constitution.
According to Dalung, “limitation of tenure is already in the constitution”, a view that fuelled wider debates about whether national sports governance should prioritise domestic law over international statutes.
As the controversy deepened, the Federal Government stepped in to stabilise the process. Then sports minister Sunday Dare directed the federation to hold elections immediately after the board’s term expired in 2022 and to amend its statutes to allow broader stakeholder participation.
The intervention also led to the withdrawal of several court cases that had threatened to stall the congress, clearing the path for a legally compliant transition.
