/ When it comes to the African Cup of Nations, football fans certainly preserve special and exceptional memories that distinguish the competition on the African continent from its counterparts in Europe, Asia and the Americas.
Although some of them were painful, these incidents made this competition unique with stories that sometimes had nothing to do with the field.
Back to some exciting moments and stories with African football.
The curse of witchcraft haunts Ivory Coast
Perhaps the most prominent story of magic and sorcery in the African Cup of Nations relates to the Ivory Coast national team, the host country for the 2024 edition, specifically when it won its first title in 1992 in Senegal.
At that time, the Ivorians had a distinguished team and prepared well for the competition. But the preparations did not include the players, as the French newspaper Le Monod revealed that the Minister of Sports at the time, Rene Deby, provided them with assistance in another way, which he described as “psychological preparation.” The minister went to the village of Akradio, which is located in the governorate from which he hails, to meet with well-known magicians with the intention of helping the “elephants” return with the cup from Dakar.
Indeed, the predictions of the Akradio magicians were fulfilled, and the team returned with the cup after an exciting final against Ghana that witnessed the longest penalty shootout in the history of international competitions, in which the famous Ivory Coast goalkeeper, Alain Gwamini, excelled.
But the story of magic with “elephants” did not stop there. After Déby defaulted on his financial obligations to the Magicians, they became angry and said at the time that a curse would befall the Ivory Coast national team and it would not win the continental cup for twenty years.
Indeed, Ivory Coast was plagued by misfortune in the African continent, and it lost the title on some occasions in a strange way, especially in the first decade of the third millennium with the generation of Didier Drogba, Aruna Kone, the Yaya brothers, Kolo Toure, goalkeeper Tizier, and Didier Zokora. Between 2006 and 2012, the “Elephants” lost two final matches, both on penalty kicks, to Egypt and then Zambia.
More than two decades after the continental coronation, Frenchman Hervé Renard was appointed coach of the team. French sports journalist Christophe Gleize said that Renard told him that his first decision was to meet these magicians to comfort them. This “maybe” good cheer was the reason why the “Elephants” returned with the cup in the 2015 edition in Equatorial Guinea.
Cameroonian legend Nkono arrested
The magic story we tell this time happened on the field and was documented in pictures. Before the semi-final of the 2002 edition between the “Lions” of Cameroon and Mali, the hosts, the famous Cameroonian goalkeeper coach, Thomas Nkono, noticed one of the Malian policemen spraying the pitch with a strange substance just before the warm-up period. Nkono quickly went to him to dissuade him from his action, and the matter ended in a clash with him before the police resorted to violence. He was arrested in handcuffs.
This altercation almost caused the match to be cancelled, and after “reconciliation” negotiations led by the Confederation of Continental Football, Nkono was released and the match was played, but the magic was of no use as Cameron Eto’o, Mboma and Rigobert Song won 3-0.
Morocco abandons the championship
Some African Cup tournaments witnessed the withdrawal of teams for various reasons, including politics, security, sports, and health as well.
In the third place match for the 1978 edition in Ghana, Tunisia advanced against Nigeria with a goal by its late striker Mohamed Ali Akid before the Nigerians equalized in the first half, but the Tunisians withdrew from the match due to what they considered “unfair” arbitration decisions, so the Confederation of African Football decided to award third place. Nigeria and depriving Tunisia of a golden generation of Tamim Al-Hazami, Tariq Dhiab, Najib Ghamid, Atuka, Ali Al-Kaabi and others from participating in the 1980 edition.
The second famous withdrawal was with Nigeria in 1996. After crowning a golden generation that included Amokachi and Amuneke in Tunisia 1994, Nigeria decided to withdraw from the next edition organized by South Africa for the first time after its return to the continental arena following the end of the apartheid era.
The withdrawal was due to a political dispute at the time between Nigerian President Sani Abacha and South African leader Nelson Mandela. The Confederation of African Football decided to prevent her from participating in the 1998 edition as well, depriving fans of watching a wonderful generation that includes Nwankwo Kanu, Okocha, Babangida, Taribo West and Victor Ikpeba. This “political” withdrawal paved the way for “Bafana Bafana” to win the title at the expense of Tunisia.
The third most famous withdrawal was for the Togolese national team, and this time it was for security reasons. In the Angola 2010 edition, the Togolese delegation chose to travel by bus to the Cabinda region, where the first round matches were played. But the mission was subjected to an armed attack on the Angolan-Congolese border, claimed by separatists of the Cabinda State Liberation Organization, while it was on its way to participate in the finals of the twenty-seventh African Cup of Nations.
The attack led to the death of a press attaché and assistant coach, in addition to wounding nine other people, including two players. The Togolese government ordered its players not to participate in the continental finals and to return to Lomé. To this end, it sent a private plane that returned the team at night to the country’s capital.
In addition to the withdrawal of teams, the African Cup of Nations has repeatedly recorded countries abandoning the organization or withdrawing from it, most of which were due to the lack of readiness of their infrastructure or for security reasons, such as the 2012 edition in Libya. But the most famous of them remains the withdrawal of the organization of the 2015 edition from Morocco and giving it to Equatorial Guinea after the Kingdom at the time demanded a postponement. The tournament was due to the spread of the Ebola virus in a number of countries on the continent.
However, the Confederation of African Football completely rejected this proposal and withdrew the organization from the Kingdom and decided to deprive it of participating in the 2017 and 2019 editions before it was withdrawn.
Zambia national team plane crash tragedy
The date of April 27, 1993 is still stuck in the history of painful events in African football, when the plane of the Zambian national team, heading to Dakar to face Senegal in the World Cup qualifiers, crashed. The entire elected delegation spent with the cabin crew.
Of that wonderful generation, the most prominent of them “survived”, the Dutch professional from PSV Eindhoven, Kalusha Bwalya, who – by coincidence – traveled in a private plane to Dakar. From the womb of this tragedy, a new historic generation was born for Zambia, led by Bwalya, and they reached a historic final in 1994, which they lost to the “Eagles” of Nigeria.
The Zambian referee escapes death
The latest rarities of the African Cup of Nations occurred in the Cameroon 2022 edition, specifically in the first round match between Mali and Tunisia, which ended prematurely. When the Malians were leading by a goal in the 84th minute, Zambian referee Gani Sikazwe announced the end of the match, to the astonishment of Tunisia’s coach at the time, Mondher El-Kebir, which caused the referee to speak with his assistants to approve the resumption of play.
Only four minutes had passed until Sikazwe again announced the end of the match, seconds before the original time ran out and without counting alternative time, amid the revolt of the Tunisian coach and his assistants. But this time, Sikazwe was determined to finish the match, and he looked tired at the time. He told the local press after the contest that he was on the verge of death and that “God told him to finish the match to save his life.”
In addition to this famous incident, coaches, players and journalists have long talked about catastrophic refereeing errors that changed the direction of continental titles for decades in Africa. But the most famous of all remains the final of Nigeria and Cameroon in 2000, when the match ended in a draw with two goals for each team, so penalty kicks were resorted to.
In a shot that was a direct reason for clinching the title in favor of Samuel Eto’o’s teammates, Tunisian referee Mourad Al-Daami and his assistant Mourad Al-Ajanki did not award a penalty kick for Nigeria after the ball hit the crossbar and crossed the goal line, depriving Nigeria of the coronation on home soil and in front of its fans.
Using a Motobikan bike as a stretcher
One of the funny moments that has remained stuck in the minds of African football followers is the use of a Motobikan motorcycle in the 1998 edition of Burkina Faso to transport injured players for treatment off the field.
In that era, the use of this type of bicycle was the primary means of transportation used by the people of Burkina Faso in their daily lives, and the “motorcycle culture” in the country was immortalized through football.
Military punishment… due to withdrawal
When the Ivory Coast players were eliminated from the first round in the Ghana-Cameroon edition in 2000, it did not occur to them that they would not land at Abidjan airport, but rather at a military base.
The mission remained for three days, and its members were treated like new recruits performing military service, and it was said that they received lessons on the concept of patriotism. After the news spread in the international press, they were released, while the authorities justified their decision to transfer them there with fear of street anger due to their disappointing performance.