‘CAF’s refusal to approve Adokie Aimiesiamaka Stadium political’

Rivers State Commissioner for Sports, Chris Green, has described as politically-motivated the Confederation of African Football’s (CAF) refusal to approve the Adokie Aimiesiamaka Stadium, Port Harcourt, as venue for Rivers United’s Confederation Cup matches.

For two seasons, Rivers United have been forced to play their home games in the competition at the Godswill Akpabio Stadium because CAF said the Port Harcourt stadium is not conducive to host top games. This is despite some experts rating the Adokie Aimiesiamaka Stadium as among the best in West Africa.

Green said, yesterday, that CAF’s directive that Rivers United’s games must be played in Uyo is to give undue advantage to their North African group opponents, Club Africaine of Tunisia.

He said: “CAF rules say that stadiums for the Confederations Cup will be inspected before the preliminary games and also the group games. CAF came to inspect the Adokie Aimiesiamaka Stadium before the CAF Confederations Cup preliminary games and it was approved.

“When Rivers United qualified for the group stage of the championship, CAF did not come to do the second inspection before pronouncing that Rivers United will be playing their group games in Uyo. This Is not fair. It is politics in CAF.

“When an Arab team is in your group, they create issues that give them advantage over you. How can CAF come and inspect the venue for preliminary games and not come to inspect the stadium for the group games before taking their decision.”

“This is politics going on in CAF. Adokie Aimiesiamaka Stadium is better than some stadiums used for CAF games. We have protested the issue and CAF said they only deal with the NFF. Giving advantage to the North African teams has been a major issue in CAF games.”