By Andrew Warshaw
August 21 – The image and reputation of African football administration has taken another significant blow with FIFA sending an emergency team into Egypt – where the Confederation of African Football is based – to solve the internal crisis at the national federation.
FIFA has appointed a panel of four men and one woman to manage the Egyptian FA by installing one of its normalisation committees until fresh elections are held within one year.
The crisis was prompted by Egypt’s shock round of 16 defeat to South Africa on home soil which led to coach Javier Aguirre and his entire staff to be fired before federation president Hany Abo Rida and other board members resigned en masse even though Abo Rida remains a member of the FIFA Council.
Rida, who said he was stepping down as a “moral obligation”, had led the Egyptian FA since 2016, in a three-year reign marked by controversy.
The decision to move into Egypt was taken by the FIFA bureau which is led by president Gianni Infantino and comprises the heads of the six continental confederations.
It is almost certainly to have been influenced by the role of FIFA general secretary Fatma Samoura who has just started her new job of supervising CAF affairs for six months following a spate of mismanagement issues, many of them involving CAF chief Ahmad Ahmad.
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