Super Eagles Coach, Rohr's Salary Crisis Deepens as Ministry Abandons NFF

The NFF appears to have run into difficulties in paying the salary of Super Eagles international coach, Gernot Rohr.

 

Gernot Rohr

 

The  sports ministry has refused to yield to pressure from the Nigeria Football Federation to help  sort  the payment of  the Super Eagles coach Gernot Rohr his three month’s salary out.

 

Rohr, who  was heavily linked with the vacant Guinea job before he was snapped  up by the NFF in August last year,  has won the country’s three competitive matches since his employment.

 

NFF had  promised that they would have no problems paying the  national coach his entitlements because  they  had firms who had agreed to support them financially.

 

But the football federation have been struggling to pay the German manager after the anonymous sponsors pulled out of their deal with them over the leadership crisis that rocked the body last year.

 

A Punch correspondent learnt  that the NFF approached the sports minister Solomon Dalung recently to help save the country from the embarrassment of  not being able to pay  Rohr.

 

But the ministry is reportedly owing a number of national coaches  and  the minister allegedly rebuffed the plea to help resolve Rohr’s salary issue.

 

It was learnt that Dalung reminded the NFF leadership that he told them before Rohr’s employment that the ministry was against the idea because of its financial implications.

 

The minister is said to be still unhappy  with development. It was learnt that the NFF had been unable to secure sponsorship to fund Rohr’s salary as the companies they approached baulked at the idea, citing    the current economic recession in the country.

 

Meanwhile, the officials of the  football house, which is in dire financial distress, have therefore intensified their search for sponsors to pay the former Niger coach before he starts complaining, according to our source.

 

Dalung’s  Media Adviser Nneka Anibeze told a correspondent that the ministry was not in a position to help the NFF because of its own financial challenges.

 

She denied that the minister had abandoned the NFF to their fate, promising that  the minister would  intervene when funds are available to the ministry.

 

“The NFF should not be  having problems paying the coach because they told the minister that they had secured sponsorship for his salary,” Anibeze told a correspondent on the telephone on Wednesday.

 

“Those saying that the minister  has abandoned the NFF are not being fair on him (Dalung) because he told them that the ministry won’t be  able to pay  a foreign  coach.”