Jordaan on Motsepe’s CAF presidency bid

by Graeme Jackson

Friday Dec 18, 2020. 11:00

South African Football Association (SAFA) president Danny Jordaan has revealed some behind-the-scenes details of Patrice Motsepe’s bid to become the next boss of the Confederation of African Football (CAF).

The South African business mogul and owner of Mamelodi Sundowns is vying with Jacques Anouma of the Ivory Coast Football Federation‚ Senegal FA president Augustin Senghor and the head of the Mauritanian federation‚ Ahmed Yahya to become the next head honcho of African football.

One of the quartet will succeed former CAF president Ahmad Ahmad, who was last month banned by world football governing body FIFA for five years due to financial misconduct. The elections for the presidency are set to be held in March 2021.

“The submission date for all the candidates was 12 November 2020‚ you know that‚ and all the candidates submitted to the FIFA Ethics Committee‚” Jordaan told Times Live.

“The FIFA Ethics Committee will go through all the candidates and you know that they have already ruled out or banned Ahmad Ahmad.

“Now we only have four candidates and on the 12th of January FIFA and CAF will submit the final list of candidates who have passed the integrity test. He [Motsepe] said look‚ I want to know who I am up against and who has gone through the integrity test so that I know.

“But what has he done in the meantime‚ he has gone to Egypt twice‚ last Thursday he met with the executive of CAF and he has been to other North African countries. We had 14 presidents present at the Sundowns 50th Year anniversary celebrations last weekend here [in South Africa] and we had other 18 presidents submitting apologies.”

Jordaan added, “We saw the presidents there at the 50th anniversary celebrations and virtually every Southern African president was there with the exception of Mauritius and Seychelles because there are no flights there.”

He continued, “Of the 14 presidents that attended the 50th anniversary celebrations‚ ten of them came from the COSAFA region and others made apologies.

“We also had from presidents Guinea Bissau‚ Benin‚ Equatorial Guinea‚ Nigeria and Burundi here. He is going to African countries directly and I think he is the only candidate that is actually going to each of the 52 African countries because he has the ability to go there and he is doing that.”