VANGUARD
Who is this, I said to myself, wondering who would be promoting Nigeria in Burkina Faso at the time.
Full in Nigerian colors (a Nigerian track suit, a Nigerian fez cap and a pair of white canvass to match), he stood at the VIP box, close to the media tribune. His Nigerian apparel attracted me. It was distinct as one of the matches of the 1998 Nations Cup was going on in February, 1998. Nigeria was not participating. Sani Abacha had stopped the Eagles from attending the 1996 edition in South Africa because of the clashes his government had with South Africa who spoke against his dictatorship and state execution of environmentalist Ken Saro-Wiwa. CAF subsequently banned Nigeria and the Eagles couldn’t defend the cup they won in 1994 in Tunisia.
So, Nigeria was serving the ban at the time the Nations Cup was going on in 1998. And there at the stadium was a man wearing Nigerian track suit at a vintage position where all the top CAF members and other dignitaries sat.
This is news, I said further to myself. I’ll chat him up if he is a Nigerian and if he is not I’ll still ask him why the Nigerian colours. I was searching for news. I walked up to him. ‘Good afternoon,’ I said before introducing myself and asking if he was a Nigerian. He introduced himself and I was excited to know he was a Nigerian. “Nigeria is not participating but you’re here watching games”, were my first comments.
He said he just liked football and came because he knew there would be good games. He was in search of good football and I was equally searching for some tit bits, you would say. We chatted and became friends. I was surprised when he visited me at Ouga Deux Mille where I lodged. He drove. Did he hire a car in Burkina Faso to attend matches? No, Abdulrahman Abdulrazak drove from Lagos to Ougadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso in search of good football. He loved such adventures but most importantly he was and still is in love with sports.
This attracted me to him. No sports journalist would meet such a person and ignore him. We discussed football all through his stay. Egypt won their 4th Nations Cup title, beating South Africa 2-0 in the final. Benni McCarthy was voted Most Valuable Player. What he did in Europe in the following years proved his Burkina Faso performance was no fluke. DR Congo won the bronze and Burkina Faso were fourth. They were classed as minnows before the Nations Cup but Phillip Troussie did a good job to transform them into a strong team within a very short time. He had earlier qualified Nigeria for the 1998 World Cup finals but was sacked by empty heads running our sports.
