There is currently insinuations that  proposed certain elements may have smuggled modifications to amend the Statutes of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) when the body holds its General Assembly next month in Kinshasa, Congo next month.

 The confederation will be having its 46^th General Assembly on 10^th October. It is at such gatherings that amendments are made to existing rules.

According to an article authored by Mansour Loum, the editor of Sports News Africa, some national football federations have denied being party to proposed amendments which were linked to them.

One of such is coming from the Equatorial Guinea Football Federation  which has denied signing proposals being circulated relating to amendments to CAF Statutes.

It is claimed that a circular dated 8 September has been sent to CAF member associations. Signed by CAF General Secretary, Véron Mosengo-Omba,  it is titled: “Proposals for amendments to the CAF statutes and regulations for the application of the statutes, as well as the rules of procedure of the CAF General Assembly, presented by the national associations.”

 Seven member associations were quoted as sponsoring the amendments. They are: Botswana, Comoros, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea, Liberia, Mauritania and Niger. 

 But Equatorial Guinea has denied being party to the proposed amendment which seek to remove age barrier for candidates seeking to be CAF Presidents and also removing zonal considerations in election into FIFA Council.

 The current Statute stipulates that a presidential candidate must not be older than 70 as at the date of election.

Most of the national federation members are already approaching that age. In the estimation of the author of the article, Mansour Loum, the current CAF president, Patrice Motsepe, is 62 years old. With the age limit, he could, for example, only run for two more terms.

Continuing, Loum wrote that regarding the elections to the FIFA Council, each zone has a representative on the FIFA Council and candidates for these positions can only be elected by the presidents of the member associations of their group zone.

Thus, the presidents of French-speaking federations can only vote for a French-speaking representative, the English-speakers for the English-speaking group, and so on.

The distribution of seats on the FIFA Council is currently as follows:

Francophone Group – Two members

Anglophone Group – Two members

Arabophone/Lusophone/Hispanophone Group – Two members

One female member elected from among the female candidates, regardless of language groups

The modification of the grouping by zonal unions would mean that all presidents could vote for candidates outside their group, or that the candidates would also no longer be limited to a group.

Several candidates from the same group could be elected to the FIFA Council, while at the same time some groups could no longer be represented.

Equatorial Guinea disputes any request for modification. The football federation president, Venancio Tomas Ndong Micha has reportedly denied being party to the proposed amendments.

“I am writing to you to present the disagreement of the Equatorial Guinean Football Federation with part of the content of the document sent to the CAF Executive Council on September 8, 2024 signed by you (…)

“In this document, there are amendments presented by the Equatorial Guinean Football Federation (…) By this letter, we confirm that the Equatorial Guinean Football Federation has not submitted any amendments to the CAF administration for the 46th CAF Ordinary General Assembly to be held on Thursday, October 10, 2024 in Kinshasa,” he denounces.

Enough to cast doubt on this document sent by the CAF secretary general and the objective targeted. Contacted, a federation president, whose body is not mentioned in the letter, is surprised by these two requests for amendments and wonders about their intentions.

The press release from the Equatorial Guinean Football Federation has sown doubt and now he is questioning the originality of the attachments included in this document which is likely to be talked about between now and the CAF General Assembly.

– Mansour Loum

UEFA has warned the UK government that England risk a ban from the Euro 2028 tournament they are co-hosting if Prime Minister Keir Starmer goes ahead with existing plans for a men’s football regulator, British media reported on Saturday.

In a letter to Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy, obtained by The Times and the BBC, European soccer governing body UEFA’s General Secretary Theodore Theodoridis said there should be “no government interference in the running of football”.

According to the letter, Theodoridis cautioned against plans outlined in the King’s Speech to give the new regulator the power to oversee clubs in England’s top five leagues, saying the game’s independence was a “fundamental requirement”.

“One particular area of concern stems from one of UEFA’s fundamental requirements, which is that there should be no government interference in the running of football,” Theodoridis wrote.

“We have specific rules that guard against this in order to guarantee the autonomy of sport and fairness of sporting competition; the ultimate sanction for which would be excluding the federation from UEFA and teams from competition.”

The previous government had announced plans to appoint a regulator last year, saying it was necessary to protect clubs from financial mismanagement and to stop wealthy teams from joining breakaway leagues.

Starmer’s government committed to the regulator in the Labour Party manifesto after being elected in July.

Theodoridis told Nandy that UEFA is “concerned about the potential for scope creep within the IFR (Independent Football Regulator).”

UEFA did not immediately respond to a Reuters’ request for comment.

“The Football Governance Bill will establish a new Independent Football Regulator that will put fans back at the heart of the game, and tackle fundamental governance problems to ensure that English football is sustainable for the benefit of the clubs’ communities going forward,” a Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport spokesperson said in a statement. 

England, Northern Ireland, Ireland, Scotland and Wales are co-hosting the 2028 European Championship.

-Reuters

International Olympic Committee presidential hopefuls, including World Athletics chief Sebastian Coe, face a set of election rules that could influence next year’s vote for the new head of the world’s biggest multi-sports organisation.

Britain’s former Olympic champion Coe, 67, and Spanish IOC Vice President Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr, the 64-year-old son of the late former IOC chief, are two of the potential candidates eyeing the top job in the Olympic body.

A letter sent this week by IOC ethics commission chief Ban Ki-moon to all members said the elected IOC president would have to be an IOC member throughout their entire term, while the age limit for IOC membership is 70 even for the top job, with only one possibility of a four-year extension.

The first term for an IOC president is eight years, which means that under current rules Coe and Samaranch, if elected, would exceed the age limit during their first years in office.

IOC members are elected either through their positions as heads of international federations and National Olympic Committees or as individual members.

Coe got onto the IOC in 2020 through his position as president of World Athletics.

“Pursuant the Olympic Charter the IOC President must be a member of the IOC at the time of the election and during the entire duration of their term as IOC President,” the letter said.

The rules do not pose any immediate problem for either Coe or Samaranch to run for the position.

They are both under the age limit and current IOC members. The rules could, however, be an obstacle during a potential presidency should Coe, for example, lose his World Athletics post that is linked to his IOC membership.

IOC presidents, however, are able to push through rule changes quite easily, either through executive board decisions or charter changes.

Neither Coe nor Samaranch immediately responded to a request for comment.

The new president will be elected by IOC members in March 2025 at a session in ancient Olympia, Greece, and will take over in June that year, Bach said, to allow a smooth transition.

The IOC will announce the list of eligible candidates on Sept. 16.

-Reuters