The fiasco that is being shown as Nigeria 2009.

The FIFA under 17 World Cup started last Saturday. Five African teams started: Nigeria, Gambia, Malawi, Algeria and Burkina Faso.

Of the lot it seems only the host nation are doing ok. Well, they better, especially because of the disgrace they are feeding the world about Africa.

They've messed up Africa's name. As if it ain't already in the doldrums.

Last Monday, the match between Spain and the United States of America was disrupted twice due to failure of the floodlights at the Sani Abacha Stadium in Kano.

Before that, on the opening day of the tournament on Saturday, the game between hosts Nigeria and Germany was delayed by half an hour because the heavy downpour made the Abuja National Stadium pitch unplayable.

What the fuck is wrong with these Nigerians? The artificial pitch at Enugu, if constructed well, would not have had such puddles as to make the pitch unplayable.

My pal Godwin Kotey at the Tema Stadium here in Ghana, which is similar to the one being used in Enugu, says that one the MAIN advantages of the artificail pitch is that during rains, the rain must not soak it, so the game can go on.

Heaven knows that football has seen worse downpours than this that have gone on to the end. And lest I forget, the game was terminated after the 60th minute. Come on Africa, if we want the rest of the world to say good things about us and FIFA has given us four events (the Confed Cup in South Africa, the Under 20 World Cup in Egypt, under 17 World Cup in Nigeri and South Africa 2010) the least we can do is to manke them feel it's been worth it.

Someone asked why on earth FIFA would give Nigeria the rights to host a tournament. Those guys have a proven track record of fiascos. They claim to be the giants of AFrica yet so much of what they do is flawed when given the chance.

This may be a sweeping statement but people should have seen the signs early when Nigeria failed to meet the requirements of Jack Warner and his folks a couple months ago.

I was doing punditry for TV3 when this disgrace occurred. I covered my head in shame at what our big brothers are doing to the name of Africa.

Let's see the explanations they give. You can read more on artificial pitches here.

In the meantime the game went on and it ended 1-1.