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 Asian Football Confederation (AFC) President Sheikh Salman Bin
Ebrahim Al Khalifa and Confederation of African Football (CAF)
counterpart Issa Hayatou signed the 'co-operation agreement' in
Rwanda, just over a month before the FIFA presidential election in
Zurich on Feb. 26.
Sheikh Salman, South African politician and businessman Tokyo
Sexwale and Prince Ali are among five candidates standing in the
election, with the Jordanian fearing vote deals had been struck
between the two confederations who will have a combined 100 votes in
the 209 member poll.
"I have always promoted cross-regional understanding, however the
timing of this MOU between the AFC and the CAF looks like a blatant
attempt to engineer a bloc vote," Prince Ali said in a statement.
"Africa’s proud football associations are not for sale and
development resources belonging to national football associations
should not be used by presidential candidates and confederation
presidents for political expediency.
"Questions must be asked: was this deal approved by the members of
the executive committees of both the AFC and CAF and is the timing
of the announcement, prior to a presidential election, acceptable?
"Now more than ever, this apparent exploitation of confederation
resources shows the world that the actions of individuals must stop
bringing FIFA into disrepute."
Former FIFA official Jerome Champagne and UEFA general secretary
Gianni Infantino are also standing in next month's election which
will go ahead with FIFA mired in the worst corruption scandal in its
history. Criminal investigations are underway in the United States
and Switzerland.
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FIFA's own ethics committee has sanctioned a number of officials,
the most notable being FIFA president Sepp Blatter and European
soccer boss Michel Platini who were both banned for eight years.
Both deny wrongdoing.
The 40-year-old Jordanian royal, who was beaten by 133-73 votes by
Blatter in the last FIFA presidential election in May, published his
election manifesto earlier this month calling for more transparency
at FIFA and term limits for senior officials.
He said FIFA faces a "catastrophic" future if the wrong man is
elected.
(Writing by Patrick Johnston in Singapore; Editing by Peter
Rutherford)
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