The board of the Badminton Federation of Nigeria (BFN) has now attained a cruising altitude after some turbulences that prevented it from taking off last October when it was initially scheduled to be inaugurated along with the other national sports Federations. 

The initial problem occasioned by litigations came to an abrupt end last month leading to reconciliation and consolidation of interests and programmes. The board has since had an inaugural meeting in which their 2022 calendar was rolled out. 

The BFN president, Francis Orbih urged all to sheath their sword as reconciliation of aggrieve parties has taken place. 

The board was further strengthened with the drafting of co-opted members such as Yahaya Faruk, Sam Addingi and Gabriel Gbayan.

Also, a suspended player, Abdulfatai Salaudeen who hitherto headed the Players’ Association was pardoned following the acceptance of a letter of apology from him. 

His suspension as well as that of the other executive members of the Players’ Association was lifted. At the inaugural meeting of the BFN, existing subcommittees were reconstituted while some new ones were created. 

The Women Development Committee, Welfare Committee and Ethics and Disciplinary Committee were the newly created arms of BFN. 

According to the president, the Women Development Committee was created to provide solutions to the dearth of women players and administrators as well as to encourage more participation of the feminine gender in badminton.

The committee is to also assist in discovering and developing female players for better performance. Another addition to the arm of government is the Ethics and Disciplinary Committee which is saddled with the responsibility of instilling discipline among players and officials as well as the review of the existing Code of Conduct. 

The Welfare committee is to cater for the welfare needs of stakeholders especially the players.

The list of the new Committee Chairmen and Chairperson are:

1. Mrs Esther Gidado - Chairperson, Women Development Committee

2. Mr Gabriel Gbayan Chairman, Welfare Committee

3. Mr. Yusuf Lawal Bello

 Chairman, Ethics and Disciplinary Committee

The president, Francis Orbih, rolled out the BFN’s programmes and called on all to support it having its core thrust to grassroots sports development, women and disabled persons inclusions as well as expanding the frontiers for national and international participation. 

To achieve the objectives, he pointed at the legacy project of a Badminton Complex which has to be given prime attention as the BFN is collaborating with the Chinese partners and the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports Development to deliver the project which will be the first of its kind in Africa.