Former Confederation of African Football (Caf) president Ahmad has accused Fifa’s ethics committee of lacking independence and suggested that the game’s governing body is controlling Africa for strategic reasons.
Ahmad was speaking to BBC Sport Africa following the end of his two-year ban from football. The 63-year-old says he wants to help local football in his homeland Madagascar after returning to the sport in December.
Ahmad’s former ally, Gianni Infantino, has been handed another four-year term as FIFA president. No rival candidate was prepared to contest Thursday’s elections, which were the first on African soil, in Rwanda. Ahmad believes his ban came after refusing to follow Infantino’s desired aims, chief among them the February 2020 decision to cancel the assistance Fifa was then giving Caf at its headquarters in Egypt.
My suspension was political,” Ahmad told BBC Sport Africa, while recalling a heated meeting between Caf and Fifa in Morocco. After African football’s ruling body chose not to extend its deal with Fifa, Infantino stormed out and headed straight to the airport. “Fatma really helped but in six months we had what we wanted so did not extend the mission, but it angered the people of Fifa – Gianni was angry,” said Ahmad.
“Upon leaving the meeting, some Fifa people were telling my colleagues that I had signed my death warrant. What is a death warrant in football? It is surely to use the ethics committee, the lethal weapon they were using at the time.” A month after Africa rejected Fifa’s offer, Ahmad was told an ethics investigation had been opened against him.
In November 2020, the ethics committee served Ahmad with a five-year ban and $200,000 fine after ruling he had breached codes relating to duty of loyalty, offering and accepting gifts, abuse of position, and misappropriation of funds. However, the Court of Arbitration for Sport reduced his sanction by over half in 2021.
Ahmad’s accusations against Fifa come amid ongoing scrutiny of the organisation’s governance and decision-making processes. Critics have long accused Fifa of being opaque and lacking transparency, and the organisation has faced numerous scandals in recent years. Infantino has promised to reform Fifa, but Ahmad’s comments suggest that significant challenges remain.
