Dr. Mohammed Sanusi, is the General Secretary, Nigeria Football Federation, A lecturer and a Coach. The Real Estate Developer's Association of Nigeria REDAN board member recently spoke with Ben Ogbemudia where he talked about a lot of issues in the Nigeria Football, as a lecturer and as an Estate Developer.
Excerpts.......
Sir, we welcome you to a very interactive session with REDANtv and REDAN magazine, Can you tell us how you got involve in REDAN and real estate business at large? Start by introducing yourself first please. Who is Muhammed Sanusi?
Mohamed Sanusi is presently the General Secretary of Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) and also a visiting lecturer in the Department of home economics and health education in Ahmadu Bello University in Zaria, and I’m also a member of Board of Trustees of REDAN.
How are you able to combine being a lecturer, the secretary general of NFF and also an estate developer?
It’s not easy at all, I will start by telling you I came from the classroom and of course the area of sports administration and management and health is so easy for me to get involved in football, haven played football, haven taught it in the classroom, haven practiced it and also being one of the coaches in Nigeria , all this Makes it an easy task for me, but I can tell you that managing Nigeria football is not an easy task as It requires a lot of your attention that is why i stopped taking undergraduate students, I only focus on masters and PhD students, and it will interest you to know that what I’m doing at Ahmadu Bello University is free of charge, I don’t take salary, so I’m just giving back to the community what the community gave to me, and I do that at my free time’s mostly weekends and online.
On the issue of real estate, already had interest on the area of housing development knowing fully well that shelter is very important couple with the fact that in the cost of my job, I find myself managing accommodation, and when opportunity came for me to look at that sector, I registered and started going to the activities of REDAN.
Will you say REDAN has given you the courage you need in the real estate sector?
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Of course, whatever you do to help people in need is not just for you but for humanity also, provision of shelter is very important, I find it very necessary to make sure that anything that has to do with accommodation is top notch.
What is your advice to Nigerians in providing housing for the common ones?
My advice to Nigerians is for everyone to do what they can to own a decent house, significantly, sickness and diseases sometimes has to do with the environment you live, so when getting a house, try to get a decent one, also government should provide infrastructure like roads, water and rest of it this will reduce the cost of housing, there should be a collaboration between the government who should provide infrastructure, the builders who should try to make houses affordable to people and of course the investors like FMBN who should also reduce the cost of what they charge so that houses can be affordable.
What is your message to Nigerians, especially players today?
I’ve always been saying versatility makes professor, you must be able to see something however small it is not just in your area but in any area that is related to your area of specialization, a player is a perishable goods just like tomatoes, when a tomato is ripe, everybody likes it but once it is rotten it’s thrown away, that is how a player is, at the time you are playing everyone likes you but once you sustain injury or cut up with age nobody looks at your side, therefore when you are playing it is important you make maximum use of what you get, it will interest you to know that some of the players we have are already estate developers, we advise them to combine playing football with education both are equally important so that when you stop playing you will have something to fall back to, in addition to that, venturing into business too is equally important.
What will you tell Nigerians about REDAN?
My advice first of all is to the lawmakers, there should be a law regulating the activities of REDAN, once that law becomes into bill then it will be very easy to regulate the activities of real estate, government can use it to track people who are engaged in money laundering, it can also be used to fight corruption once the law is sealed and there is a body that is charged with that responsibility then definitely there will be peace and harmony between the estate developers and the government and agencies that fight corruption.
