Ghananian referee Joseph Lamptey has been suspended for three months following the controversial penalty he awarded to South Africa in their 2-1 win over Senegal in last weekend’s 2018 World Cup qualifiers.

The Senegalese Football Association (SFS) sent a letter of protest to Confederation of Africa Football requesting investigations to the icident that was roundly criticised across the continent.

SFS through a statement have now confirmed that the referee has been suspended by the African football governing body.

“Following the dispute and protest letter from the FSF on the refereeing of the match between South Africa and Senegal, CAF informs that its Referee Commission has decided to suspend referee Lamptey for three months. The latter being thus excluded from the next African Nations Cup in Gabon, because of his poor performance,” the FSF said in a statement.

Lamptey awarded South Africa a penalty in the 43rd minute after adjudging that Idrissa Gana Gueye had handled the ball inside his penalty area.

Television replays however  showed that the ball had hit the player’s legs with the referee over ruling his assistant who had indicated a corner that even the South African players were eager to take.

The Ghanaian referee suspension has become the recent  high profile case following the previous one where Mauritanian Rajindraparsad Seechurn was banned for six months after calamtious handling of 2015 Africa Cup of Nations match between Equatorial Guinea and Tunisia.