…..Morocco wins right to host 2025 edition
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) announced on Wednesday that Morocco would host the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON), while Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania will jointly host the 2027 edition.
Morocco was selected to host the AFCON in 2015, however the country requested that the competition be postponed due to the Ebola outbreak. Nevertheless, CAF ultimately opted to revoke Morocco’s hosting rights. Morocco had last hosted the AFCON in 1988.
Although Morocco was the clear favourites to host the 2025 edition of the biggest sporting event in Africa, Algeria’s shocking last-minute withdrawal from the 2027 competition on Tuesday left the door ajar.
“This withdrawal can be explained by a new approach from the FAF related to its strategy for developing football in Algeria,” said the national federation.
The CAF executive committee then approved the Kenya-Uganda-Tanzania bid, returning the biannual tournament to east Africa for the first time since Ethiopia hosted the 1976 competition.
Morocco is home to a large number of top-notch stadiums and has successfully hosted both African and international competitions.
However, Uganda lacks any international-standard venues, while Kenya and Tanzania have one each, forcing their national team to play 2023 Cup of Nations qualifiers at neutral locations.
The tournament is being held in east Africa in response to CAF President Patrice Motsepe’s declaration this year that he opposed holding consecutive championships in the same area.
“We cannot assign the organisation of the CAN successively to the same region,” he said at a press conference before the African Nations Championship (CHAN) in Algeria last January.
However, several months later, CAF secretary general Veron Mosengo-Omba said regional rotation may not always be possible.
“Today, only five or six countries out of the 54 CAF members are able to apply to host the African Cup. Consequently, it will not be possible to make this alternation,” he said
Ivory Coast will host the 2023 Cup of Nations, which has been put back to January and February 2024 due to the rainy season in west Africa.
“The timing is not ideal,” Motsepe has said, referring to the tournament falling in the middle of the European club season.
“But we could not risk the tournament being disrupted by inclement weather,” added the South African billionaire, who was appointed CAF president in 2021.
Chronicle NG had earlier reported that Minister of Sport, Senator John Owan-Enoh led the Nigerian delegation to Egypt with the aim of clinching the 2027 AFCON hosting right which was jointly proposed by Nigeria and Benin Republic
