Ten months after announcing an AFCON every four years, CAF has reversed course and kept the biennial cycle. Patrice Motsepe, president of the body, justifies the U-turn by the desire to “advance, protect and promote” African football.
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) has finally abandoned plans to stage the Africa Cup of Nations every four years. According to Peoples Daily, the body is keeping the biennial cycle, ten months after announcing a switch to a four-year periodicity. A U-turn that Patrice Motsepe, CAF president, explains by the desire to “advance, protect and promote” the interests of African football.
Financially, the 2025 AFCON in Morocco was expected to generate a projected profit of 114 million dollars (85 million pounds), against 75 million dollars (56 million pounds) for the previous edition in Ivory Coast.
A U-turn ten months later
The announcement had nevertheless been clear. Before the 2025 AFCON in Morocco, Patrice Motsepe had announced a switch to a four-year cycle from 2028. In the end, CAF went back on the project, as reported by Peoples Daily.
To justify the choice, the president of the body invokes the desire to “advance, protect and promote” the interests of African football.
Federations sceptical
The four-year AFCON project had been met with reserve by a large part of the national federations. Sydney Mungala, an official of the Football Association of Zambia (FAZ), sums up the feeling: “I think the general sentiment around the continent has been that the two-year cycle has served the continent very well. The idea of pushing it to a four-year cycle was a bit of a surprise, maybe a concern, to the bulk of the African federations.” In substance, that the biennial cycle has served the continent well and that moving it to four years was a surprise, even a concern, for most African federations.
The history of the competition points the same way. Since 1957, the AFCON has been held mostly every two years, with only two three-year gaps in the 1960s and a one-year gap between 2012 and 2013.
A Nations League as an alternative
To offset a possible switch to a four-year format, a project for an annual African Nations League bringing together the 54 countries had been proposed. But CAF ultimately chose to keep the AFCON every two years.
The 2027 AFCON is scheduled for Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, subject to CAF confirmation.