Governing Bodies
CAF PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS: IVORIAN ANOUMA REPORTEDLY REBUFFS FIFA’S PRESSURE TO STEP DOWN
It has been gathered that despite his meeting with the other candidates at the weekend in Rabat, Ivorian Jacques Anouma has refused to step down and thus presses on his intention to contest for CAF presidency.
This, it was gathered, has thwarted FIFA’s plans. The elections into various positions in CAF as well as the continent’s representatives in FIFA Council will hold next week Friday (12 March).
Sports Village Square gathered four other candidates have agreed to step down for the preferred man, Patrice Motsepe of South Africa, Anouma who was disqualified in the bid to contest against Hayatou in 2012 intends to press on with his candidacy.
The weekend meeting was more of horse-trading by the candidates. Anouma, it was gathered insisted that it was only the president of his country, Alassane Qattara, whom he would soon meet, can dissuade him from contesting.
A sports newspaper in Cote d’Ivoire quoted the 69-year old man as saying that the text signed in Rabat was only a meeting report that does not commit him to a final agreement.
According to the report, Anouma felt he was tricked to the Rabat meeting. He had expected to meet only the other two presidential candidates from West Africa – Senegalese Augustin Senghor and Mauritanian Ahmed Yahya, he did not know that South Africa’s Motsepe was programmed to also attend.
Convinced that he has his chances and that he can aim better than the post of “special adviser” which was promised to him, the Ivorian begins to scare the FIFA, which tries to pull the strings behind the scenes and which has makes Motsepe the preferred candidate.
Some also believe that it is no coincidence that Anouma received a letter on February 26 from FIFA asking him to account for the financing of his campaign.
FIFA suspects the candidate of having received financial support of 15.3 million euros (ten billion CFA francs) from the Ivorian authorities. But in a statement issued by Anouma who had a decade ago battled Nigeria’s Dr. Amos Adamu for the leadership of the then unified West African Football Union (WAFU), the Ivorian responded to FIFA:
“It should be noted that the candidate does not receive funding from the Ivorian authorities, the latter having undertaken, through the press release sanctioning the Council of Ministers of January 20, 2021, to carry out diplomatic and relational actions for the promotion of candidacy.”
Governing Bodies
Nigeria becoming an epicentre of global badminton as Francis Orbih enters the Badminton World Federation Council
Laurels on the courts and now glory in the boardroom sums up the mark that badminton is making in Nigeria.
The President, Badminton Federation of Nigeria (BFN), Francis Orbih, has been elected as a council member of the Badminton World Federation (BWF).
The election took place during the BWF Annual General Meeting on Saturday in Xiamen, China.
Orbih emerged victorious over top contenders from other African countries.
He will join Cameroon’s Odette Assembe Engoulou on the council, while Chipo Zumburani (Zimbabwe) and Hadia ElSaid (Egypt) missed out.
An elated Orbih expressed his gratitude to fellow badminton presidents across the globe for their trust and support.
He said, “I am deeply honoured by the trust placed in me by my peers across the badminton world.
“I look forward to quality representation, driving development initiatives, and strengthening badminton’s global reach over the next four years.”
Orbih also acknowledged the support of the Federal Government of Nigeria, particularly the National Sports Commission (NSC), which he said played a significant role in his successful bid.
“The Chairman and the Director General of the NSC monitored the entire process. I’m grateful for their involvement and confident Nigeria will benefit from this,” he stated.
He further appreciated the BFN board members and the Nigerian badminton community for their prayers and continued belief in his leadership.
“From the day I declared my intentions, the board members of BFN have been supportive, and I promise not to disappoint them,” Orbih concluded.
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A former member of the FIFA Council, Mamoutou Toure, has been released from jail in Mali after almost two years in detention for alleged corruption, Malian media reports said on Wednesday.
Toure, president of the Malian Football Federation since 2019, was released after 622 days in prison on Tuesday.
He served on the FIFA Council, world football’s all-powerful decision-making body, for four years until last month when he lost his seat after failing to contest new elections.
The 67-year-old was arrested in August 2023 on allegations of embezzling $28 million of public funds but was granted a provisional release order by the Malian courts, reports said.
He was accused of misconduct during his time as the National Assembly’s financial and administrative director from 2013-2019.
Toure denied all charges and, during his time in jail, was last August re-elected as Malian Football Federation president for a second consecutive term, with his supporters claiming he was a victim of a conspiracy fuelled by detractors.
While in jail, he received a letter of support from FIFA president Gianni Infantino. However, as of last month, Toure is no longer a member of the FIFA Council or the Confederation of African Football’s executive committee.
-Reuters
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The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has denied reports of an outstanding debt to former captain Christian Chukwu and has challenged anyone with verifiable documents to prove otherwise.
Chukwu, a former national team captain and chief coach, died last Saturday.
The Nigeria Football Federation decried statements in a section of social media that the football-ruling body was indebted to the deceased.
Reacting to one statement on social media that claimed NFF owed the 1980 Africa Cup of Nations-winning team captain the sum of $128,000, NFF General Secretary, Dr Mohammed Sanusi, said: “There is no record in the NFF of any outstanding indebtedness to ‘Chairman’ Christian Chukwu.
“During the first term of the Board headed by Amaju Pinnick, a committee was set up to diligently peruse the papers of coaches who were being owed, even from previous NFF administrations.
“That committee was given the clear mandate to verify all debts and ensure that the coaches being owed were paid immediately. I am aware that the ‘Chairman’ was in the employ of the NFF between 2002 and 2005, before he was relieved of the post following the 1-1 draw with Angola in a FIFA World Cup qualifying match in Kano in August 2005. There is certainly no record of indebtedness to him in the NFF.”
Sanusi challenged anyone with genuine and verifiable documents of NFF indebtedness to any coach, who has worked with any of the National Teams over the past two decades, to come forward and tender those documents.
“As a credible organization that is very much alive to its responsibilities, if we are confronted with any genuine document of indebtedness to any coach, we will offset the debt immediately.”
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Nigeria becoming an epicentre of global badminton as Francis Orbih enters the Badminton World Federation Council
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