By Koffi Raphael
South African Sole candidate Patrice Motsepe was confirmed as Confederation of African Football (CAF) president in Rabat the capital city of Morocco on Friday.
Motsepe is the ninth richest man in Africa with a personal wealth estimated at $2.9 billion (2.4 billion euros) by Forbes magazine. He owns 2016 CAF Champions League winners Mamelodi Sundowns.
Just a few weeks ago, Motsepe, Ivorian Jacques Anouma, Mauritanian Ahmed Yahya and Senegalese Augustin Senghor were locked in an intriguing struggle for the presidency.
But FIFA-brokered meetings of the contenders in Morocco and Mauritania led to Motsepe becoming the sole candidate. Senghor and Yahya were given the first and second vice-president roles.
Anouma, who initially declared the pact “undemocratic”, is a former FIFA executive committee member and becomes a special advisor to Motsepe
Last November, Madagascar’s Ahmad Ahmad became the first CAF president to be banned by FIFA, with a five-year suspension for “governance issues” cut to two after appealing to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
The Malagasy ended the 29-year reign of Cameroonian Issa Hayatou in a shock outcome to the 2017 presidential election.
But after a promising start, Ahmad stumbled from one crisis to another, which eventually led to him exiting the presidency in disgrace.
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