Caf blame social media team for Victor Gomes Afcon final controversy

South African official Victor Gomes was even congratulated by Safa for being appointed for the Afcon final. Photo: Gavin Barker/BackpagePix

South African official Victor Gomes was even congratulated by Safa for being appointed for the Afcon final. Photo: Gavin Barker/BackpagePix

Published Jul 19, 2019

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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

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