Congolese football is bad. At a sporting level, the results are catastrophic: national team A failed to qualify for either the World Cup in Qatar or the last African Cup of Nations, in Cameroon, and is far from guaranteed in Côte d'Ivoire in 2023. As for local team, was eliminated in the first phase of the last African Cup of Nations, in Algeria, while the national championship has been on hold for more than three months.
The institutional situation is also very tense. So much so that on FIFA's side, the idea of suspending the federation and appointing a standardization committee, to quality joins the Confederation of African Football (CAF), has come to fruition.
Embezzlement and scandal
According to our information, things accelerated in Kigali, on the sidelines of the FIFA congress. “The sanction will fall at the end of March or beginning of April. FIFA did not want to announce this during the international break, which will see the DRC face Mauritania in the qualifiers for CAN 2024 [le 24 mars à Lubumbashi et le 28 mars à Nouakchott]confirms a source close to Fecofa, currently chaired by Donatien Tshimanga.This choice was made for several reasons.
First to prepare the new election for the presidency of the federation, which should have taken place next April. But the process of validating the new statutes was delayed and this standardization commission, which was initially supposed to be appointed for six months, will have to prepare for this election.
Then, Congolese football faces a vast pedophilia scandal, as revealed in November 2021 by French journalist Roman Molina no website Sports News Africa.FIFA, which had not issued the slightest reaction, had, according to several sources, decided to act.
Finally, the world football body learned that the amounts paid to Fecofa for television broadcasting rights relating to the World Cup qualifiers had been partially embezzled by members of the federation's executive committee. A investigation is in progress.
Distance duel between CAF and Constant Omari
As the establishment of this standardization approach approaches, the intensity increases. Some Congolese football players actually suspect that CAF could take an active role in this process. “Dieudonne Sambi Nsele-Lutu, the financial director of Fecofa, has his supporters in CAF such as the general secretary, Veron Mosengo-Omba, who want him to be named chairman of this dinner, blow up one of our sources. CAF fears that one of the former president's relatives Constant Omari not be elected. However, the latter and Mosengo-Omba do not like each other. »
From the Kinshasa side, there are rumors that Theo Binamungu, the former secretary general of Fecofa (whom many in the DRC blame for having turned a blind eye to the pedophilia scandal) and Roger Bondembe, former CFO during the Omari era, is seriously considering running for the position. A hypothesis that does not delight CAF.
“CAF wanted Didier Drogba be elected to the presidency of the Ivorian federation, and that is Idriss Diallo who was. In Cameroon, she officially supported Seidou Mbombo Njoya, the outgoing president, and that is Samuel Eto'o who made the bet. She is therefore not enthusiastic about the prospect of seeing one of Africa's biggest federations run by a committee that will not support her,” adds one other source.
