The Confederation of African Football CAF should consider suspending all of its upcoming events for now until a later date in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.
CAF announced a statement that its competitions will go ahead. All Africa Cup of Nations Qualifiers scheduled for this month will go on with some games set to be played behind closed doors. The Continental Football governing body also says that the CHAN which begins in April will not be postponed.
Several countries in Africa have already taken stringent measures to combat the spread of Covid-19 which has been declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization.
WHO has not yet declared African countries as high risk even though this may change if the situation is not managed properly.
Among the Nations who are considering calling off their games include Kenya whose government has asked its FA to call off their upcoming Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Comoros. Morocco, Egypt and Tunisia have also taken various measures against matches in the respective nations.
Coronavirus cases have currently been recorded in twelve African nations, with Egypt the worst affected.
On Tuesday, Algeria’s government announced that the remainder of the football season would be played behind closed doors because of the outbreak while others, such as Rwanda among others, have insisted on no handshaking prior to games.
The Italian government has ordered a lock-down on the entire country while all sporting activities have been postponed. The Serie A has been halted as health authorities battle to contain the outbreak.
If CAF does not cancel its competitions, it could mean African players based in Italy and Europe will have to travel across different airports spreading the virus to others. The lock-down in Italy might mean African players might not be available to their respective countries for the qualifiers. A good number of players from Gambia, Senegal, Nigeria, Morocco etc play in the Italian League and this could disadvantage other teams.
CAF have a very important decision to make and must not wait for the disease to spread before they act on it.
Cancelling ALL competitions might have a toll on revenue which Football brings to CAF but in this regard, human life should come first and as such, all competitions in AFRICA must come to a halt until the virus is contained.
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