THIS is not the best of time for members of the Nigerian Football Supporters Club in Brazil. Reasons: they are being prevented by overzealous police officers at the stadium from carrying out their function.
The development has not gone down well with the President General of the body, Dr Rafiu Ladipo.
In their usual way of adding glamour and urging the Eagles to bring out their best in every game, members of the Supporters club stormed Brazil in large numbers wearing their uniform. They had perfected various theme songs to ginger the players even when things were going poorly. But a rude shock came their way on Monday evening, when officials attached to the Arena Baisada in Curitiba stopped them from going into the stadium with their drums and trumpets.
“This is like playing a double standard,” an angry Ladipo told The Guardian shortly after the Eagles struggled to a 0-0 draw against Iran. “The reasons they gave was that they don’t want people to go into the stadium with instrument that could easily be converted into missiles. To us, that is a not a good excuse and we won’t take this lightly.
“The Nigerian supporters club is not known for violence and this is not our first World Cup appearance. We have been doing this as our contribution to the game of football, not only in Nigeria, but throughout Africa and the World. And for FIFA security committee to wake up all of a sudden to stop us from wearing our usual clothes, beating our drums and blowing our trumpets is not the best.
“During the opening match, the host country was allowed to use their samba with various instruments and drums. So, why stop the Nigerian supporters from backing their team? We have written a letter to FIFA on this and we expect a positive result because FIFA is in love with what we are doing.” Ladipo stated.
He added: “You can see that the absent of our drums and trumpets affected the Eagles in the match against Iran. We have a way of communicating to the players through our drums and that was missing in the game. We are not trying to apportion blames here, but FIFA should as a matter of urgency, see reasons with us and allow us use our drums and trumpets.”