Globacom Tables N550 Million For
2012/2013 NPFL Season Wed, 20/03/2013 - 9:10pm | NAN Telecommunications giant, Globacom, has tabled a
cheque for N550 million for the sponsorship of the
2012/2013 Nigeria Professional Football League
(NPFL). Mr Nduka Irabor, Chairman of the League
Management Committee (LMC) of the NPFL,
announced this on Wednesday to newsmen in
Abuja. Irabor said the money was paid by Globacom after
it paid a hands-off ``title sponsorship right’’
compensation fee of N100 million to Total
Promotions. Total Promotions owned the sponsorship right
under the Nigeria Premier League (NPL). According to Irabor, the N550 million sponsorship
money will appreciate by 10 per cent annually for
the next three years when the contract will lapse. The LMC boss said the new romance with
Globacom and Total Promotions was to ensure that
they had nothing to do with the NPL after the court
had pronounced it an illegal body. Irabor also said that the LMC, now registered as a
corporate entity, was at liberty to do business for
the NPFL. ``Both the NFL and NPL, whatever name they were
called, were illegal. ``I didn’t declare that; it was the pronouncement of
an Abuja Federal High Court presided over by
Justice Donatus Okoruwa. ``Now, to do business and give faith and
confidence to the people you are transacting
business with, you need to reassure them that you
are a legal entity. ``We thought that the uncertainty and instability
that beclouded the league’s activities in the past
impeded its revenue generation potential. ``So, we decided to find a way out of the problems
and the first step was to legalise our name. ``To legalise it, we went to the original name of the
league and we called it NPFL; then we called the
managing company, the League Management
Company (LMC). ``We have a licence of the NFA to run the league;
we have their mandate.’’ He explained that the LMC board in the making,
would ensure that the NPFL was run professionally
like its counterparts in Europe. Irabor said plans were being made to up-the-
stakes in the NPFL to N2.5 billion in the next 18
months, as the minimum wage for a player would
be expected to hit N150,000 a month. ``The LMC will have a board of directors just the
way most corporate organisations do. ``We will have a Chief Executive Officer of the LMC
who may or may not be a member of any club as a
member of the board. ``You have to be a member of the company so
long as you are a member of the league and you
have to be a member of the league so long as you
meet the conditions necessary to be a member of
the league. ``The clubs who are automatic members of the
league will sit and nominate three persons among
them to be part of the governing board. ``The NFA will sit in the board as a silent observer
to ensure that what we are doing is in conformity
with the dictates of the statutes of football. ``We are also setting up licences for the clubs and
there are conditions that a club must meet to be a
premier league side; it will not be an all comers
league.’’

leadership.ng/nga/articles/50533/2013/03/20/globacom_tables_n550_million_20122013_npfl_season.html

Kudos to Irabor and Globacom!