Algeria Secures CAF Executive Seat, Aims to Boost Sports Diplomacy

As the sole candidate for re-election, Walid Sadi was unsurprisingly re-elected as president of the FAF. "Today, I have talked a lot about soft power. You can see that with football, we are now intervening in the policies of states. This is why I think the President of the Republic has a strong strategic vision through which he wants sports diplomacy to regain all its power," he told the press after his re-election.

He added: "It is necessary to strengthen the national front, particularly in the media field. This is why I insist on the concept of soft power. Today, some countries intervene in the policies of other nations through sport."

According to some observers, these statements by the FAF president sound like Algeria’s desire to wage an influence war against Morocco within the governing bodies of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and FIFA. By maintaining Walid Sadi at the head of the FAF, cumulatively with his functions as Minister of Sports, Algeria obtains a seat on the CAF executive committee, like Morocco represented by Fouzi Lekjaa, president of the Moroccan Football Federation (FRMF).

This initiative by Algeria follows the last-minute withdrawal of the candidacy of the Tunisian Hussein Jeneh. According to the Tunisian press, Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune would have contacted his Tunisian counterpart Kaïs Saïed to request the withdrawal of the Tunisian candidate in exchange for a secret agreement.