Shooting Stars team: being owed 5 months

The League Management Company (LMC) says discussions with clubs and the Trade Union Congress (TUC) are ongoing over the backlog of salaries owed players in the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL).

Salisu Abubakar, Chief Operating Officer (COO) of LMC, some of the unpaid salaries dated as far back as 2004.

He said the discussion became necessary following the decision of TUC to picket match venues of those clubs that have failed to pay their clubs from April 25 (Wednesday).

“If you look at the monies being owed some of them for thirteen years, fifteen years. Some of the people owing have since left the management of the clubs and some of the people owed are dead.

“Some of them are incapacitated and we feel for the families; this is their legitimate earning and right and we will fight for it.

“This is something we can’t do in isolation; everybody knows how the country is today, so we will try to find a workable solution. We will work together to find a solution to the issue.’’

He said the recent partnership deal signed with the Spanish Premier League (La Liga) would go a long way to ending clubs’ indebtedness to players.

“We are expecting a lot of boost to the league and we will copy a lot of things from La Liga; they are among the top teams in the world.

“From the performance of their teams, two teams qualified for the semi-finals of the UEFA Champions League and two teams qualified in the Europa League and they are doing well.

“So, these are the things we are hoping to make the league in Nigeria be; we want our league to be the best in Africa and among the top in the world; that is our ambition.

“We believe that with our partner with La Liga this is going to be realised very soon; we are going to have areas of collaboration on technical, player development, coaches, marketing and information management and so on.’’

The LMC and La Liga partnership deal signed on April 26 is expected to last five years.