June 4 – Ethiopian football has a new leader, albeit after a protracted election process, in Esayas Jira who takes over Juneidi Basha after polling 87 of 145 votes at the national federation’s General Assembly.
The elections had been postponed four times by FIFA which had ordered Ethiopia to make changes to its electoral process in a bid to bring it in line with FIFA statutes.
Esayas worked as a football administrator for the last 20 years and beat three other candidates.
“I am so overjoyed. After a long, overdue and rocky journey we put an end to this nightmare. I am just elated,” Jira told the BBC .
In the first poll on Sunday, FIFA’s representative deemed the election illegitimate after Jira failed to win a majority vote. In the re-run later in the day, Jira secured a landslide victory.
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