Stakeholders Unveil Warri United Football Club In Delta

• To Establish 775 Community Ownership Clubs In Nigeria

A new football club christened Warri United Football Club, (WUFC), has been unveiled in the commercial city of Warri, Delta State.

The football club was made public on Saturday, October 2, 2021, at the Octagon and Waterfront Place in Warri during a press briefing by Dr Louis Brown Ogbeifun on behalf of Board of Directors of the Club and other Football enthusiast in the state.

Dr Ogbeifun who is the President of the Warri United Club, and the Chairman of the Stephen Keshi Football and Vocational Centre, Obazuwa (SKFVTC), said that the new football club is woven around community ownership.

He said that the football club would be community-based because football has become a culture of the people, saying that football culture is typified by all and sundry playing football everywhere there is any little space.

According to him, “Within the clusters of those playing the game are embedded different ethnic groups reinforcing that football speaks an undiluted universal language that unifies”.

WUFC, he said, was established as a legal entity with the Corporate Affairs Commission in August 2021 and in line with the CFF framework as a Community Ownership Football Club to create a Culture of football density at the grassroots that will be commercially viable.

Ogbefun, a former Team Manager, the NNPC Football Team to three consecutive Nigeria Oil and Gas Industry Games, and former Chairman of the Nigeria Oil and Gas Industry Games, said that the club’s board of trustees had adopted the Motto;”The Club, the people, and their culture” because football has a cultural expression that acts as a cohesive force that binds people of all ages, gender, and races together.

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He said; “Football, like culture as a way of life, shows a common, shared interest and aspiration. That is why football is synonymous with the concept of a team with a sense of discipline and unifying commonality.

“Therefore, we hope that Warri shall again soon experience the love for the game as those days of the Jaramaes, the NPA FC, the NNPC FC, and the NEPA FC.

“It will interest you to note that God used football to put food on the tables of almost all the Directors of this Club. In our days, we were lucky to get employment in outstanding organizations like the defunct New Nigeria Bank. National Electric Power Authority. Nigeria Ports Authority, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation. Sharks of Port Harcourt, etcetera.

“Our coming together, therefore, is to give back to society part of what it gave us. The innovation will also help as an employment-generating platform for our talented youths. Let us clarify that the CFF has not come to supplant the current football model but to complement and supplement it by ensuring that each local government has a football club that is a communally connected entity without relying on the government for funding.

“There is no gainsaying that football today is a highly paying source of legitimate earnings that provides a living for people worldwide. It is, therefore, with a great sense of commitment and utmost trust in God Almighty that we shall nurture the Warri United Football Club to a superb and enviable position in football circles in the nearest future.

He further said that the soon-to-be launch football club was desirous to establish 774 Community Ownership Football Clubs in Nigeria, which shall translate to one in each LGA in Nigeria under the auspices of the Community Football Foundation (CFF), with Comrade Austin Popo as the Founder and the National Coordinator.

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Other members of the board of Directors of the new WUFC are as follows:

1. The National Coordinator and the CFF Facilitator, the PFAN Board of Trustee’s Secretary, Secretary of the Board of Trustees, the Stephen Keshi Football and Vocational Centre. Obazuwa (SKFVTC), is a former NNB attacking pearl and Ex International Austin Popo,

2. The Vice President of the WUFC is the Chairman, Nigeria Football Supporters Club Delta State Chapter, Hon. Jones Orighomisan Agimnuku.

3. The Secretary of the BOT of WUFC is Comrade Steve Okwechime and the Secretary of the Football Intermediaries Association of Nigeria FIAN,

4. The Football Director of the WUFC is an Ex international, the Deputy General Secretary of PFAN, former General Manager of Warri Wolves and Bendel Insurance and a former Super Eagles midfield Maestro, Edema Fuludu (MON).

5. Director IT Marketing And Media of the WUPC is Pastor (Comrade) Aloysius Okerieke.

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6. Comrade Winluck Bowofere (Director), a former NITEL. FC, and Mobil FC. Eket football player.

7. Comrade Victor Olley, an astute union leader and a former Branch Chairman of the PENGASSAN Shell Branch in the country.