| 2023 Conference | Keynotes | Program 2023 | Conference 2023 Panelists | Registration Fee Payment |
Yomi Ebenezer Ejikunle, University of Louisville (doctoral student)
Yomi Ebenezer, Ejikunle is a doctoral student at Pan African Studies Department, University of Louisville. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in History from the University of Ibadan in Nigeria. His interest is in medical history and history of sports development in Africa. Yomi’s research mission is to contribute to scholarly conversation on the history of soccer development in post-colonial Nigeria.
ABSTRACT:
“Capital Cities and Politics of Football Monopolization in Nigeria.”
Football emerged as the most famous sporting activity in Nigeria in the colonial epoch. Colonial capital city of Lagos was the first point of attraction to organized football with the formation of Lagos District Amateur Football Association in 1931. With the influence of European settlements in Lagos, football clubs sprang up and the city emerged as point of attractions to players across the federation. The clubs monopolized the national Challenge Cup competition that started in 1949 for a decade before teams outside Lagos became strong contenders. At the post-civil war era during the Nigerian football league, a tradition of giving state support to a football club at the expense of other clubs within same regions emerged and was sustained till after the state restructuring of 1976 that made Nigeria a nineteen states federation. The Shooting Stars football club of Ibadan, Rangers International club of Enugu and Bendel Insurance of Benin received total supports of their respective regions while other clubs struggled for assistance which never surfaced and rendered them as second-class teams. This research aims to interrogate how politics of power, place, people and position influenced football club formation, club funding, team selection, sponsorship, and support in post-colonial Nigeria. The research intends to argue that football clubs in capital cities have identity status that were beyond football and this identity attracted them to authorities and people as the most preferred.
