By David Ngobua At the moment, the playing surface of Godswill Akpabio International Stadium, Uyo is under serious pressure due to the number of matches it hosts almost on a weekly basis. The reason for the ongoing abuse of the 30,000 capacity stadium built by the president of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio, when he was the governor of Akwa Ibom State, is that it is the only facility that is approved by FIFA and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to host the Nigerian senior national football team’s matches. The privately owned Remo Stars Stadium in Ikenne, Ogun State can only host CAF inter-club competitions like the Champions League and the Confederation Cup.
In fact, Nigeria’s shame was exposed by CAF on July 11, 2024 when the continental football governing body published the list of stadiums it had approved to host its competitions. While South Africa topped the list with as many as 11 world class stadiums, Morocco, Egypt and Cote d’Ivoire followed with six each just as Algeria and Cameroon shone brightly with five and four stadiums respectively. Even smaller nations like Botswana, Rwanda, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, Uganda and Zambia have more than one approved stadium.
But the self-acclaimed giant of Africa (Nigeria) has only one approved by CAF. Before independence and post-independence, the National Stadium, Surulere in Lagos was the official home ground of the Red Devils and the Green Eagles, which was renamed as the Super Eagles after the Africa C.