South African referee Victor Gomes was never appointed as
the referee for the Africa Cup of Nations final.
That is the word from the chairman of the Caf Referees
Commission, Souleyman Waberi, after Cameroon’s
Alioum Alioum was named as the ‘new’ referee for the title decider between Senegal and Algeria
in Cairo on
Friday night (9pm SA time kickoff).
The Insideworldfootball website reported on Friday that
Waberi insisted that Gomes’ ‘appointment’, which was announced on Caf’s social
media channels, had not been made by the commission.
“The Referees Commission did not make any appointment of the
referee for today’s final until after the third-place match, between Nigeria and Tunisia. I was very shocked, like
anyone else, to see the announcement of Victor Gomes on Caf’s social media
handles,” Waberi said.
“The moment I saw it, I went to see Anthony Baffoe (Caf’s
Deputy General Secretary – Football and Development) and asked him who
gave the communications department the right to make such an announcement?
“He was also surprised about it. We then had to order that
those announcements be taken off all Caf social media.
“This type of mistake should never happen. But the
announcement of Gomes never came from the Referees Commission.
“We must improve our communication as an organisation. What
happened is not acceptable, and people have the right to criticise us for
this.”
The embarrassing episode led to even the SA Football
Association sending out a statement of congratulations to Gomes.
But it all turned out to be a false alarm.
The Caf head of marketing, Abdel Bah, told the
InsideWorldFootball website that a separate company who handled the
organisation’s digital communication during Afcon was to blame for the gaffe.
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/AFCON2019?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#AFCON2019 #ALGSEN referee mystery: This man, Alioum Alioum of Cameroon, is in charge of Friday’s final. But @CAF_Online reported, on its twitter handle, that Victor Gomes of @SAFA_net will be in charge. What happened? I will now explain. READ THIS THREAD. pic.twitter.com/WEarmrLWkD
— Osasu Obayiuwana (@osasuo)
“We are using an external company for our social media
offerings during this tournament. Unfortunately, those responsible got news,
from outside Caf, that Victor Gomes was the referee,” Bah said.
“They thought that the information officially came from Caf,
which they failed to cross-check.
“As soon as the Referees’ Commission heard about this, they
informed us that the information was not correct, and it was taken down.”
Gomes will not be involved in the final in any capacity, but
another South African, Zakhele Siwela, will be one of the VAR assistants.
@ashfakmohamed