Africa-Press – Lesotho. Lesotho is among a host of African countries that did not vote for Morocco on Wednesday in their bid to host the 2026 World Cup. Instead, a joint bid by the United States, Canada and Mexico won the right to hold the global football showpiece in 2026 after a vote of FIFA delegates in Moscow, Russia.
The bid by the three North American countries was coined the ‘United’ bid by its organisers. It won the voting with 134 votes to Morocco’s 65 out of 203 delegates that were eligible to vote at the 68th annual FIFA congress held on the eve of the 2018 tournament which starts today in Russia.
Morocco had hoped to become the second African nation to host the tournament but suffered defeat in a World Cup bidding process for the fifth time. Disappointingly for Morocco, Lesotho joined South Africa, Kenya, Guinea, Liberia, Benin, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Mozambique and Namibia as the African countries that voted for the United bid.
Meanwhile, one delegate representing Asian nation Iran voted ‘none of the above’. The voting results mean the world’s biggest football festival will go to North America for the first time since 1994.
Morocco had travelled through Africa asking their fellow nations to vote for them at the FIFA Congress in Russia and was also counting on support from some European countries.
However, rumours spread that numerous African countries would not vote for Morocco due to political differences while separate reports said other nations were unhappy with Morocco’s decision to withdraw from hosting the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) because it feared the outbreak of the Ebola disease in some West African countries.
While there were a lot of reports on the internet speculating why African countries snubbed one of their own, South Africa made their stance clear before jetting to Russia.
South Africa said it would vote for the United bid because Morocco did not support its efforts to stage the 2010 World Cup which it eventually won the rights to host.
