The Control Commission of the International Amateur Football Federation (FIFA) rejected, on Tuesday 26 January 2021, for various reasons, the candidacies of Ahmad Ahmad, Constant Omari and Kheïreddine Zetchi for the Presidency of the African Football Confederation.
Malagasy Ahmad, Congolese Omari and Algerian Zetchi were rejected by FIFA for the CAF elections scheduled for 12 March 2021. The former, who was seeking a second term as head of the African football authority, had been suspended for five years from all football-related activities by the Ethics Commission for abuse of power and misappropriation of funds. He filed an appeal with the Arbitral Tribunal for Sport (SBT), which has not yet rendered its final decision.It is therefore no surprise that the nomination of the outgoing President of the FCA was rejected.
The current acting president of the CAF, Constant Omari, has been the subject of “a formal investigation underway by the FIFA Ethics Commission” for several weeks.However, there is still no conviction against him. Finally, the boss of Algerian football, Kheïreddine Zetchi, was disqualified for failing to “report sanctions imposed by the CAF and the Algerian Professional Football League”.
Although Ahmad Ahmad and Constant Omari did not speak out, the president of the Algerian Football Federation (FAF), Kheïreddine Zetchi, did not take long to react to the decision of the FIFA control committee.He has already announced that he will file an appeal. “I have actually received a letter from FIFA that invalidates my application. The reasons given are the fact that I did not mention on the questionnaire two sanctions, namely: an internal sanction that was issued in 2016 when I was official in my club for a statement to the press. The second is a penalty at the FCA level for leaving the CHAN organizing committee in 2018. I completed the form in good faith. Today, I do not want to go into more detail because I want to use my right of recourse. I will be able to provide further clarification on this matter after the final decision,” he said.
On the other hand, four candidates were validated by the commission headed by Mukul Mudgal for the next elections. These are those of Me Augustin Senghor, president of the Senegalese Football Federation (FSF), of the former president of the Ivorian Football Federation (FIF), Jacques Anouma, of the president of the Football Federation of the Islamic Republic of Mauritania (FFRIM), Ahmed Yahya, and the president of the Mamelodi Sundowns, Patrice Motsepe of South Africa.
