Report … How was Egypt’s place at FIFA and CAF endangered?

The Egyptian seat in the executive office of FIFA, occupied by engineer Hani Abu Raida, former president of the Egyptian Football Association, is in danger, following the official candidacy of the Moroccan Faouzi Lakjaa, as well as the confirmed news of the candidacy from the president of the Algerian Football Federation, Khair El Din Zazchi.

Abu Raida announced the official candidacy for the FIFA executive team through an official statement issued in recent days (see here)

Abu Raida is one of the oldest members of the CAF Executive Office since 2004, a member of the FIFA Supreme Council since 2009, and one of the eight members of the International Federation of Soccer Law IFAB.

For its part, the Moroccan Football Association announced that Mr. Faouzi Lajqa, president of the Royal Moroccan Football Federation, will participate in the electoral race for a position in the executive office of FIFA to compete directly with the engineer Hani Abu Rida, and that this candidacy is the first of its kind for Morocco in FIFA (See from here)

But in the beginning, how will the elections for the FIFA Executive Office take place and where will these elections take place?

Elections for the Executive Office of FIFA and CAF will take place in Morocco in March 2021, on the sidelines of the CAF elections.

Africa has 7 seats in the FIFA Executive Office, including one seat for the president of the CAF and one seat for a woman, so that the remaining seats are geographically distributed throughout the continent as the Arabic-speaking countries have two seats, the English-speaking two seats and the French-speaking two seats knowing that the position of president is discounted according to the geographical division for example.For example, if Mozebi from South Africa wins the presidency of the CAF, a seat of the participation of English-speaking countries.

The CAF contest featured the candidacy of Ahmed Ahmed from Madagascar, Jacques Anoma from Senegal (French-speaking), Ahmed Ould Yahya from Mauritania (Arabic) and the South African Patrice Mutsibi (English-speaking) who stood for election.

Where is the crisis?

The crisis with respect to the Egyptian square lies in the candidacy of the Moroccan Faouzi Lakjaa, in addition to the confirmation of the news received from Algeria that Khaireddine Zetchi, one of the closest collaborators of Gianni Infantino, the current president of the International Association of Soccer, is a candidate.

What makes things difficult is the candidacy of Ahmed Ould Yahya of Mauritania for the position of president enough, and if successful, he will be a member of the FIFA executives by extension, but as we mentioned above, he will take a seat from the quota of Arabic speakers to keep Lajaa, Abu Rida and Zotchi in competition for a position, which is what reduces Egyptian fortunes.

It should be noted that winning the position of executive office in FIFA grants the owner a subsidiary position in the executive office of CAF.

Should engineer Hani Abu Raida fail to secure the FIFA seat, he will be left out of Kef by extension, which will hurt Egypt, which for the first time will be outside CAF’s walls for a long time.