Abedi Pele eyes CAF's top position

Two of Africa's greatest all-time football players Abedi Pele Ayew and George Oppong Weah have emerged as serious candidates to take over the Confederation of African Football (Caf) presidency from the beleaguered Issa Hayatou.

A high-profile meeting of some of Africa's big-wigs in football will meet in Tripoli, Libya, in three weeks' time where a general outcry for a change of the CAF regime will be voiced.

Among issues that will be discussed is dissatisfaction with the current Caf leadership under Hayatou.

The Tripoli meeting, ironically the centre of Sepp Blatter's Fifa presidential campaign against Hayatou, will discuss how and what credentials should the future Caf president have.

It will further look at the domination by Francophone countries of the African football ruling body.

Sometime last May Libya convened the same meeting where a call for the replacement of the current Caf regime was discussed.

Global Media Alliance's general manager in Accra, Foussena Djagba, confirmed the meeting and said although the belief was that Ayew was not yet ready, there has been offers from the Fifa officials to help a campaign to challenge Hayatou's presidency.

Among those in favour of the Ghanaian are almost all Cosafa members with South Africa in the forefront.

"It has been a point of discussion that if there was anyone to challenge for the Caf presidency, it has to be someone who has done a lot for football on the continent," said Djagba.

Ayew's and Weah's names have come into contention.

They have done a lot for African football.

"Abedi is in the Ghana FA executive and has always believed that with South Africa having lost the bid by one vote, it was viable that the rest of Africa support Safa for Africa to benefit - hence we believe he is the right candidate for the challenge," said Djagba.

Global Media Alliance is the company that represents Ayew in football matters and his manages his itinerary.

Although it's still secret, a lot of African federations did not vote for Hayatou in the last Fifa presidential election, largely because they were dissatisfied with the level of upliftment and marketing of football in the region - with the Caf Cup and Mandela Cup ailing without sponsorships.

Hayatou was indecisive in endorsing one candidate when Morocco and South Africa were bidding to host the 2006 World Cup finals.

The Caf president's popularity stakes have dropped so alarmingly there are allegations of a group of European-based football administrators who are planning to fund Abedi's campaign.

"Hayatou's mandate comes to an end in 2004.

"That is when there will be elections and campaigning for the presidency," said Danny Jordaan, the SA 2010 world cup bid chief executive.

Kaizer Chiefs' strongman, Kaizer Motaung, has repeatedly made calls for the resignation or dismantling of the Caf executive.

Motaung even rightly predicted outright victory for Sepp Blatter after Hayatou failed; with half the voting countries in Africa backing Blatter.