Nigeria dropped what most observers felt was its unrealistic bid to host the 2010 Soccer World Cup finals on Monday and threw its weight behind South Africa’s rival claim.
Nigerian Minister of Sport Musa Mohammed said his country could not afford to stage the world’s biggest sporting event because of its commitment to the All Africa Games and a Commonwealth Summit.
But many commentators in Nigeria said the bid had been badly put together from the start and stood little chance against South Africa in the race to host Africa’s first World Cup finals.
”The federal government has withdrawn from the bid of the 2010 World Cup fiesta, and lends its full support to South Africa,” Mohammed said in a terse statement to reporters in Abuja.
Nigeria’s bid committee had been due to join five other African nations in Zurich on Tuesday to put their case before world soccer’s governing body Fifa.
But the head of the committee, Segun Odegebami, said the government had withdrawn its support from the campaign, forcing soccer authorities to bow to public criticism and withdraw.
”The government has spoken and it appears it is the wish of the people as, since we began our efforts to bring the tournament to Nigeria, there has been a lot of criticism,” he said.
Nigeria’s bid had come under attack for its disorganisation, in particular an ill-prepared attempt to rope its West African neighbours into a joint bid to co-host the event.
”The government is now doing what it ought to have done five, six months ago, because right from the beginning this was a most unrealistic bid,” sport publisher Paul Bassey said.
”We stood no chance because our bid was faulty from when the bid committee went against Fifa guidelines and wanted us to host the competition along with Cameroon, Ghana, Togo and Benin.”
Mohammed admitted that the joint bid, never fully supported by the other countries, had not been welcomed by Fifa, but said that financial constraints were the main problem.
Next month Nigeria is to host the eighth All Africa Games — Africa’s Olympics — which has necessitated a huge investment in a new national stadium, athletes’ village and sports venues.
Preparations for the event have been dogged by accusations of incompetence and corruption.
Meanwhile, Nigeria will in December play host to heads of state and government, including Queen Elizabeth II of Britain, at the Commonwealth Summit, another costly extravaganza.
”The enormous expenditure by the government in these events is high and therefore makes the World Cup bid undesirable at the moment,” Mohammed said.
And a senior ministerial aide said: ”The bid was not realistic and the committee knew the government’s position on this. It would have been very difficult to have pulled out had we gone ahead to submit a comprehensive bid and so it was just as well that we took the decision now,” he added.
Nigeria has a mixed record of hosting major events.
The country’s own domestic cup final was this month postponed indefinitely after crowd trouble in one of the semifinals, when the referee was stabbed in the leg by angry fans.
And last year an attempt to host the Miss World beauty pageant was humiliatingly abandoned after religious riots left more than 200 people dead and drove thousands from their homes.
Nevertheless, some observers were disappointed that the bid could not had gone ahead, if only as a dry run for future attempts to host the championships.
Dare Esan, editor of the Complete Sports newspaper, noted that Morocco and South Africa had gained valuable experience in their failed bid for the 2006 finals.
”We may not have won the right to host the tournament but we would have made a statement as a big African country that is very passionate about its football,” he said.
The 2010 World Cup was promised to Africa after South Africa lost out by one vote to Germany in its bid host the 2006 finals.
South Africa is the clear favourite this time round. — Sapa-AFP