The plans of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to hijack the cash gift given to the Nigeria Under-23, shortly after they won bronze at the Rio 2016 Olympics was foiled by captain of the Nigeria team John Obi Mikel.
A total of $390,000 was given to the bronze winning Nigeria team by Japanese surgeon Dr. Katsuya Takasu shortly after their 3-2 win over Honduras, but the NFF asked for the said amount to be given to the Federation which is presently battling financial crunch.
However, captain of the team Mikel foiled their plans by clearly telling them that any attempt to hijack the money from the team will make them boycott the tie against Honduras.
Officials of the NFF also failed in their attempts to make the Japanese philanthropist hand the money out to the Federation in cash, apparently after Mikel contacted him not to change his plans of handing out the money in cheque.
The cheque was written in the names of Mikel Obi and coach Samson Siasia, with Mikel in charge of distributing the money among the team.
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