FIFA Take Action Over Homophobia
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The website www.allout.org has launched a petitionasking for FIFA to give Nigerian Football Federation the red card for kicking women off the national team, not because they were bad players, but because they were lesbians.
It comes as the coach of Nigeria's women's football team Eucharia Uche told the New York Times that she has dealt with "the big problem" of lesbianism on the team, as it enters the Women's World Cup.
"Homosexuality is a dirty thing, spiritually and morally it is very, very wrong," Uche is quoted as saying in German daily Bild.
Although Uche says she has no proof that there are any gay players in the Super Falcons team, in the past she has brought in pentecostal priests to pray and offer her team guidance on the issue.
Before Uche took charge in 2009, players are reported to have been thrown out of the Nigerian side under suspicion of being lesbians.
FIFA's says it wants to use football to promote social and cultural understanding, with its mission statement reading that it wants to use the sport in 'overcoming social and cultural obstacles for women with the ultimate aim of improving women's standing in society'.
At a FIFA press conference in Berlin, President Sepp Blatter said he had no knowledge of Nigeria players being cut from the team because of their sexuality.
The Nigerian team has lost its first match at the Women's World Cup to France 1-0.
Posted in: International News
By GayNZ.com Daily News staff
By GayNZ.com Daily News staff
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