CAF election: Buhari overrides Pinnick, orders support for Hayatou

IN what is seen as a last minute intervention by the Federal Government, President Muhammadu Buhari has ordered that Nigeria vote for Issa Hayatou in the upcoming Confederation of African Football (CAF) presidential election, Tribunesprot has authoritatively gathered.

Elections for the office of CAF president, the Executive Committee of the continent’s football ruling body and the FIFA Council will be held at the 39th Ordinary General Congress of CAF in Addis Ababa, on March 16 with politics and intrigues playing out ahead of the date.

Among such is the declaration by the president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Amaju Pinnick, that he will vote for Ahmad Ahmad, Hayatou’s opponent, in the election. Pinnick had before the latest development, got the approval of the Ministry of Sports to use his discretion to vote for the candidate “who will best serve Nigeria’s footballing interest.”

But Tribunesport, at the weekend, was reliably informed by a source about how the applecart was upset with President Buhari expressly passing the message to Pinnick that Hayatou and not Ahmad, is Nigeria’s choice for the CAF presidency.

According to the impeccable source, President Buhari, before his return to Nigeria on Friday from London, where he had gone to for his medical leave, had put a call through to Acting President Yemi Osinbajo that Pinnick as the NFF president, must vote for Hayatou and not Ahmad, the president of the Madagascar Football Association.

Following the instruction, Acting President Osinbajo was said to have invited sports minister Solomon Dalung to another meeting after the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting last Wednesday. After Dalung was informed “about the instruction of President Buhari” on Wednesday, the message was conveyed to the General Secretary of the NFF, Dr Mohammed Sanusi, who informed Pinnick on Thursday.

“Pinnick was told that even if no country, including Cameroon, votes for Hayatou and he gets just one vote from that election in Addis Ababa, that vote must be Nigeria’s,”  the source told Tribunesport.

To be doubly sure that Pinnick actually voted for Hayatou, the source added that the NFF president was told to snap his ballot and bring it to Nigeria after the election as proof.

While in London, President Buhari not only put a call through to Professor Osinbajo on the Hayatou matter; Tribunesport was informed that the Nigerian president also spoke to some other African leaders on the need by their countries to support Hayatou.

This was said to have thrown Ahmad’s camp into confusion and Tribunesport’s source believes that an immediate effect  of this is the decision by the South African FA president, Danny Jordaan, to pull out, last Tuesday, of the race to be a member of the FIFA Council.

Election of Africa’s representatives in the FIFA Council will also take place on March 16. South Africa and the entire southern African region are Ahmad’s stronghold. South Sudan’s Chabur Goc Alei also withdrew from the race same day. Meanwhile, former African Footballer of the Year and Zambia’s one-time FA president, Kalusha Bwalya, had dropped out of the FIFA Council race four days before.

At the upcoming CAF congress, Pinnick himself will be contesting for the CAF Executive Committee seat alloted to Zone 3 (Zone West B) with Anjorin Moucharafou of the Republic of Benin.