When The Nigeria Football Fund (TNFF) was officially unveiled to would-be investors and football stakeholders in the country on Tuesday, March 22, 2022, it received a rousing hearty welcome because the fund came with a lot of features aimed at turning our football industry from its obscure recreational status to a pure business enterprise.
Many invitees who witnessed the epoch-making event attested to the fact that TNFF is very different from other existing Funds in the market.
As a kicker, an investor in TNFF will notice that the fund has three major unique irresistible and rewarding features different from other funds in the market.
First, most of the existing Funds are either Equity, Money Market, Bonds or Real Estate Funds, but TNFF is a Football Fund which has never existed anywhere in the African continent or in the world. It is also a unique developmental Fund which is more of a national project that is distinct and novel. The Fund completely uses a blue ocean strategy that differentiates it from others.
Second, TNFF is committed to building a “Football Economy” within the Nigeria sports ecosystem that is aimed at solving a major national challenge. For purpose of clarity, a Football Economy consists of football and other sporting activities measurable in statistical terms as a significant component of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. Other sporting activities include Basketball, Boxing, Athletics, Table/Lawn Tennis, Golf, Polo, Cricket, etc.
At present, Football and other sports in Nigeria are faced with challenges like inadequate funding, poor infrastructure, administrative hiccups and poor event management, amongst others. Thus, the TNFF initiative seeks to provide liquidity support to football or sporting projects targeted at the growth and development of the football economy and its value chain in Africa’s most populous black nation, Nigeria.
As noted earlier, TNFF is a national project that seeks to address the various challenges in the sports ecosystem, build a strong and sustainable football/sports economy by delivering efficiency in the funding management and administration of the beautiful game.
TNFF is also a project that will help transform football from a socio-political tool to a profitable business enterprise and by extension, a national asset that will help in transforming Nigerian Football Clubs into a profitable business enterprise, with the multiplier effects that will drive a cycle of growth across several other sectors. TNFF further supports government’s drive for revenue diversification.
However, the third special feature of TNFF is that it guarantees financial rewards for the passion investors have for football or sports in general. Here, passion for sports/football is rewarded with financial returns, as sporting/football fans become football investors and become financially rewarded for it.
Simply put, investment by corporate bodies or individuals in TNFF is an investment in the development of football in Nigeria and such investment will help in promoting Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in Football.
For example, many corporate bodies incur yearly expenditures on sponsorships, which are usually written off in their statement of profit or loss. Thus, TNFF provides an opportunity to capitalize such “donations” made to develop football infrastructures, thereby assisting in restructuring the balance sheet through the reclassification of “donations to football” to “investment in football”.
Finally, every investor in TNFF has nothing to fear because the fund has been so uniquely designed for safety in order to provide a win-win situation for the investors, stakeholders and it enhances the growth cum development of the beautiful game in Nigeria.
TNFF is the only magical wand that can lay a rock-solid foundation; propel our football to a desirable height and also lessen the burden of government in funding a professional sport like football.
The time for local and foreign investors to invest in TNFF is now because of the growth potential of the investment. It may be too late to get it at a lower price in the near future for a stitch in time saves nine.
