CAF election: four candidates in the running and a compromise found by Fifa?

South African Patrice Motsepe, in September 2019. Noam Galai / GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA / Getty Images via AFP

Text by: Farid Achache Follow

4 min

Has Fifa found a compromise between the four candidates for the presidency of CAF?

The South African Patrice Motsepe would be brought to the head of CAF, the Senegalese Augustin Senghor would be its first vice-president and the Mauritanian Ahmed Yahya, 2nd vice-president.

As for the Ivorian Jacques Anouma, he would have a post of special adviser to the president.

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“ 

I respect him a lot

(Gianni Infantino, president of Fifa, editor's note).

When I decided to introduce myself, I called him, like some of his collaborators, and we spoke.

I do not have to deflower our conversation but for the most part, Infantino holds the same speech to all the candidates: it is an election of CAF, not of Fifa.

Even if the elected president will be vice-president of the International Federation 

”, explained the Senegalese Augustin Senghor last December in the columns of the daily

L'Équipe

.

Except that Infantino obviously has a say in the next president of CAF.

Various sources report an arrangement found by Fifa to distribute the senior management positions of CAF among the candidates for the succession of Malagasy Ahmad who will know by March 3 if the Court of Arbitration for Sport lifts the sanction of Fifa ineligibility for five years

.

Fifa emissaries in Rabat

According to the Senegalese newspaper

Sud-Quotidien,

at the end of a meeting held on February 27 and 28 in Rabat with the three candidates from West Africa, two emissaries of Fifa, the Swede Mattias Grafström (principal assistant of the President of Fifa) and Congolese Véron Mosengo-Omba (director of the FIFA member associations division) have reached an agreement on the distribution of roles in the future African executive.

Presented as the favorite of Fifa, the South African Patrice Motsepe would take the presidency.

Senegalese Augustin Senghor would be its first vice-president and Mauritanian Ahmed Yahya, his second vice-president.

As for the Ivorian Jacques Anouma, he would be appointed "special adviser" to the president.

No candidate for the presidency of CAF has reacted for the moment.

In recent weeks, Gianni Infantino has toured the African continent.

Did he take the temperature with the heads of state to know if the candidacy of Patrice Motsepe was appreciated, or did he come to announce the choice of Fifa?

Patrice Motsepe, tenth fortune on the African continent according to the latest ranking by the American magazine Forbes, was also the first black billionaire in South Africa and he is, with his 2.6 billion dollars, the third richest man in the country.

One of her older sisters, Tshepo Motsepe, is the wife of the head of state, Cyril Ramaphosa.

Since 2004, he has been the president of FC Mamelodi Sundowns, the most successful football club in South Africa, which in 2016 won the CAF Champions League against the prestigious Egyptian team Zamalek.

In 2017, the club had offered the African Supercup.

I want to make my modest contribution in all circumstances in order to use sport to unite Africans,

 " the 58-year-old South African businessman said Thursday, February 25, at a press conference.

"

 We will succeed and we will make African football competitive at the international level

 ," he said.

Fifa would have asked the candidates to make up their minds before March 6.

In Rabat, on March 12, the voting method, one vote for each of the 54 federations, announced a disputed election.

CAF had never known so many contenders for the title.

Fifa is not looking for the ideal profile for African football but only a puppet

 ", however recently assured AFP Bacary Cissé, boss of the sports weekly

Senegal Record

.

In February, Fatma Samoura, secretary general of Fifa, assured a Senegalese media that " 

the best candidate is the one chosen by the 54 African federations members of CAF, according to their criteria

 ".

And to add: " 

May the best win

.

"

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