Publications
Partners
Johannesburg - African football chief Issa Hayatou insists the continent's football decision-makers are yet to decide whether they will be challenging Sepp Blatter's 12-year reign as FIFA president at the next elections.
Last week, Asian Football Confederation (AFC) boss Muhamed Bin Hammam vowed to present a candidate to run against Blatter when his term expires next year.
The current FIFA supremo, who turns 74 next month, has been at the helm since 1998 and has already indicated his keenness to continue.
And Hayatou, the world governing body's vice-president and Confederation of African Football (CAF) head, is refusing to be drawn into the debate.
He said: "I've also heard about this recently when I was away from my country.
"I'm in a little bit of a precarious position because I am a FIFA executive member and the head of a confederation.
"Therefore, I am not authorised to take such a decision on my own. For this I will need to go back to the big African family of football, so that we together can discuss what the FIFA delegate from Asia has said.
"If I say something now, I may be accused of being an authoritarian, just like some people say I am. This is perhaps something to talk about later."
Hayatou has come in for plenty of criticism over the past month, following a decision by CAF to ban Togo from the next two African Nations Cup tournaments.
The move came after the Sparrow Hawks withdrew from the 2010 competition in Angola in the aftermath of a gun attack on the team bus that left three people dead and injured several others.
CAF said Togo's withdrawal, which came after a government request, amounted to "interference" from the highest authority and the country's subsequent appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) was thrown out - at least until further investigation.
Hayatou continued: "You have been following the news with regard to Togo and should know that the matter is now with the legal company CAS.
"We will definitely abide by their decision on this affair. Therefore, I do not have any further comments."
The Cameroonian, who was speaking in South Africa during a feedback session of a World Cup Organising Committee (OC) board meeting, also cast aside doubts the tournament will not be a true reflection of the continent.
He added: "As I said, the Local Organising Committee will make sure there is an African flavour and it is an African World Cup.
"All the different continents have their ways of welcoming the World Cup and welcoming the different people to their regions. During the Confederations Cup, there were vuvuzelas and this was a true representation of what African and South African culture is.
"With the 64 games here, the Local Organising Committee will definitely do its best together with South Africans to make sure it is a true African World Cup."
Meanwhile, it was also confirmed 2.24million out of 2.9million tickets have already been sold with just over 100 days to go to the June 11 kick-off.
The LOC also announced the approval of a major re-categorisation of tickets in order to benefit locals.
Category four tickets, only available to South Africans at a cost of R140 (£12), had been increased from 11 to 29% of the total.
Chief executive officer of the local organising committee, Danny Jordaan, said: "You have to take into account that football fans in South Africa are working-class people of low income.
"Therefore, we created a special category four ticket. When we announced this initially, the general impression was, if you look at an ordinary stadium, it is logical to split the four categories into 25% each to make up 100%.
"But what happened was initially we only had 11% of the tickets in category four. We have now seen from the ticket requests by South Africans that it is much more than 11%, so the board has decided to make the tournament affordable.
"This is to benefit all those football fans who have been supporting football for all of these years. We have decided they must not be excluded.
"So we have moved the percentage of tickets available in category four to 29% and can therefore accommodate all of those that made the ticket requests in category four."
Last week, Asian Football Confederation (AFC) boss Muhamed Bin Hammam vowed to present a candidate to run against Blatter when his term expires next year.
The current FIFA supremo, who turns 74 next month, has been at the helm since 1998 and has already indicated his keenness to continue.
And Hayatou, the world governing body's vice-president and Confederation of African Football (CAF) head, is refusing to be drawn into the debate.
He said: "I've also heard about this recently when I was away from my country.
"I'm in a little bit of a precarious position because I am a FIFA executive member and the head of a confederation.
"Therefore, I am not authorised to take such a decision on my own. For this I will need to go back to the big African family of football, so that we together can discuss what the FIFA delegate from Asia has said.
"If I say something now, I may be accused of being an authoritarian, just like some people say I am. This is perhaps something to talk about later."
Hayatou has come in for plenty of criticism over the past month, following a decision by CAF to ban Togo from the next two African Nations Cup tournaments.
The move came after the Sparrow Hawks withdrew from the 2010 competition in Angola in the aftermath of a gun attack on the team bus that left three people dead and injured several others.
CAF said Togo's withdrawal, which came after a government request, amounted to "interference" from the highest authority and the country's subsequent appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) was thrown out - at least until further investigation.
Hayatou continued: "You have been following the news with regard to Togo and should know that the matter is now with the legal company CAS.
"We will definitely abide by their decision on this affair. Therefore, I do not have any further comments."
The Cameroonian, who was speaking in South Africa during a feedback session of a World Cup Organising Committee (OC) board meeting, also cast aside doubts the tournament will not be a true reflection of the continent.
He added: "As I said, the Local Organising Committee will make sure there is an African flavour and it is an African World Cup.
"All the different continents have their ways of welcoming the World Cup and welcoming the different people to their regions. During the Confederations Cup, there were vuvuzelas and this was a true representation of what African and South African culture is.
"With the 64 games here, the Local Organising Committee will definitely do its best together with South Africans to make sure it is a true African World Cup."
Meanwhile, it was also confirmed 2.24million out of 2.9million tickets have already been sold with just over 100 days to go to the June 11 kick-off.
The LOC also announced the approval of a major re-categorisation of tickets in order to benefit locals.
Category four tickets, only available to South Africans at a cost of R140 (£12), had been increased from 11 to 29% of the total.
Chief executive officer of the local organising committee, Danny Jordaan, said: "You have to take into account that football fans in South Africa are working-class people of low income.
"Therefore, we created a special category four ticket. When we announced this initially, the general impression was, if you look at an ordinary stadium, it is logical to split the four categories into 25% each to make up 100%.
"But what happened was initially we only had 11% of the tickets in category four. We have now seen from the ticket requests by South Africans that it is much more than 11%, so the board has decided to make the tournament affordable.
"This is to benefit all those football fans who have been supporting football for all of these years. We have decided they must not be excluded.
"So we have moved the percentage of tickets available in category four to 29% and can therefore accommodate all of those that made the ticket requests in category four."
