On Monday, Sanni Zubair, the president of the Nigeria Referees Association, reiterated the body’s commitment to ensuring that referees performing below par were flushed out of the country’s domestic leagues.

Mr Zubair said this in Lagos amid poor officiating by match officials.

The 10-week-old 2023/2024 Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) season has witnessed several complaints about poor officiating.

“Aside from the players, a referee has the utmost power to make or mar a match; we have put in place several measures to stand as a deterrent. We don’t care who the god-father is,” the NRA president said. “Once the fact has been established that a referee has erred deliberately, such a person will face the full wrath of the law guiding principles of officiating.”

Mr Zubair added, “Our recent decision to punish some match officials shows that we’re not playing; we will do what we can to ensure that we flush out bad referees and make players have confidence in officiating 100 per cent.”

On November 6, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) suspended 14 referees in the ongoing NPFL season over poor officiating.

The referees suspended included Bawa Buhari, Chukwuka Jahlove, Akinwale Tomiwa, Saeed Abdulaziz, Jimmy Aimugbonrie, Brown Ebenezer, Atuwho Morrison, Imamu Maliki, Sunday Azi and the four match officials involved in a Matchday Six fixture between Sunshine Stars and Abia Warriors.

Furthermore, the video clips of the matchday five encounters between Gombe United and Plateau United, as well as the week seven fixture between Bendel Insurance and Remo Stars in Benin, where a potential goal of the season scored by a Remo Stars player was controversially disallowed, were viewed.

(NAN)