Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has not accepted the retirement of Dubai-based Super Eagles striker Emmanuel Emenike until the NFF Technical Committee decides on the official letter he submitted to the federation.
The President of the NFF, Amaju Pinnick disclosed this in Abuja on Monday night shortly after the emergency committee meeting held at the Board Room of the federation.
He, however, faulted the player’s way of announcing his retirement through social media instead of writing officially to the federation.
“Somebody that has played for the nation for five years and now decided to retire are you going to stop him from doing so?”, the NFF boss asked rhetorically.
“As a federation we waited for official correspondence and I think he has written to us officially. We have forwarded the letter to the Technical Committee and we are waiting for advice from them on what to do before we make our decision on the matter.
“If the Technical Committee says we should call him and find out from him why he made the decision to quit the national team now. Fine we will call him. But the truth is that Emmanuel Emenike is somebody that has contributed a lot to the game of football in Nigeria. We also respect him but we also believe that things should not be done in the media. We have a football federation that is quite assessable.
“He should have talked to us even if you don’t want to play for the country again because of your (Emenike) great contribution to the game in the country we will look for a befitting farewell in terms of playing a game. We can go to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to play such game or insert the programme in the last game he could have played for the country.
“This is something we expect from a player that has seen it all in this game”, Pinnick disclosed.