‘FIFA, Infantino Never Pressured CAF Over AFCON’
After a tumultuous couple of weeks, Africa’s biggest football competition, The African Cup of Nations, will kick off on Sunday.
The host nation Cameroon will take on Burkina Faso.
In the past few weeks, there has been a lot of drama surrounding the competition.
Just a few days before Christmas, many fans and the media were not sure the competition was going to hold as planned.
The fear was fuelled by the refusal of some European clubs to release their players on time.
There were accusations and counter-accusations, which some saw as the blatant disrespect of the continent’s biggest competition by the foreign media.
This saw former Arsenal legends Ian Wright and Patrick Viera call for more respect for the tournament.
There was the accusation that CAF itself was not ready to conduct its own tournament by some quarters of the African fan base and the media.
Chief amongst these accusations was the one leveled against Gianni Infantino, the current president of the World Football’s governing body, FIFA.
It was alleged that Infantino and his team at FIFA wanted the AFCON postponed to possibly satisfy the Europeans, who are obviously the powerhouse of football.
Bbut there has never been any record of Infantino or FIFA remotely suggesting that the competition needed to be postponed to appease the Europeans or any other confederation.
This accusation was primarily fuelled by the African media, who were probably worried that the competition that brings joy to so many Africans across the continent was in danger.
Neither Infantino nor FIFA insinuated that the competition should be postponed. It was all a figment of some people’s imagination.
CAF Vice President and Senegalese Football Federation (FSF) president Augustin Senghor officially addressed the accusation during an event on boxing day.
“The president of FIFA, Gianni Infantino, has never considered the postponement of the CAN 2022.
“Personally, I worked with all of FIFA’s decision-makers in Doha for almost a week.
“There is not a single one among them, from the president to the Secretary-General, and all the other members of FIFA, who have come to tell me that the CAN should be postponed. Infantino never pressured CAF leaders for a postponement of the CAN.
“Infantino never pressured CAF leaders for a postponement of the CAN. He never raised this issue with me. He never raised this question with me,” Senghor said.
This appears to absolve FIFA and Infantino of any interference in Africa’s business, and for FIFA, a body that has always advocated for the independence of its confederations and member associations, you would expect nothing less.
– The Nation
