Former Gombe State Football Association chairman Shuaibu Gara-Gombe has welcomed the Nigeria Football Federation’s decision to establish a fact-finding committee to investigate the recurring failures of the country’s national teams.
Gara-Gombe believes seeking an independent assessment of the problems affecting Nigerian football is a positive step, particularly because the sport has repeatedly struggled to turn previous recommendations into meaningful reforms.
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The NFF recently inaugurated a six-member fact-finding committee, chaired by former Nigeria international Fanny Amun, following a series of disappointing results involving the country’s national teams.
Gara-Gombe said an independent perspective can help identify issues that may be difficult for the football authorities to recognise from within the existing system.
“It is a welcome development because sometimes you need an independent opinion on matters concerning football.”
However, the former Gombe FA chairman expressed reservations about what will happen after the committee submits its report.
According to him, Nigeria has never been short of ideas or recommendations when it comes to solving its football problems. The recurring difficulty, he argued, has been the failure to implement those recommendations.
Gara-Gombe has previously made a similar argument about Nigerian football, maintaining that repeatedly changing NFF leadership without addressing deeper structural weaknesses will not automatically improve the country’s fortunes. He has described the problems as systemic and called for reforms that go beyond personalities.
His latest comments therefore place particular emphasis on what happens after the committee completes its work.
The fact-finding exercise comes after a difficult period for Nigeria, with the Super Eagles failing to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the Super Falcons subsequently missing the 2027 Women’s World Cup for the first time in their history.
The Flying Eagles also suffered a heavy defeat to Burkina Faso in the WAFU-B U-20 final, adding to calls for a broader review of the country’s football development and administration.
Gara-Gombe believes the committee should therefore be allowed to work independently and produce practical recommendations, but insists the real test will be whether the NFF and other stakeholders are prepared to act on them.
For Gara-Gombe, the success of the exercise will not be measured by the quality of the report alone, but by the willingness of Nigerian football authorities to implement its recommendations.
