The President of the Confederation of Africa Football Ahmad
Ahmad has been accused of sexual harassment a day after he was
released by the French Police on Friday.
A public relations consultant from Mali, Mariam Diakite, told
The New York Times that she was fired by Ahmad for rejecting his
advances.
Diakite, 34 said she had a confrontation with Ahmad in a hotel
suite during a conference she was hired to organise in Rabat,
Morocco in 2017.
She stated that Ahmad informed her he was terminating her
appointment because he had informed officials that they were in a
romantic relationship and that it would be a conflict of interest
if she carried on working.
“He (Ahmad) was refusing to let me work because I refused to
marry him,” Diakite was quoted as saying by The New York Times.
“When you are a president and you’ve got people whose dreams is
to work in football and you say, ‘come to my room and I will give
you a job.’ Is that not an abuse of power?”
Ahmad in his response to a question from The New York Times on
the incident with Diakite labelled her accusation as a ‘smear of
character.”
He also stated that the move is part of a personal vendetta
against him being orchestrated by a former senior employee of
CAF.
“They are lies,” Ahmad told The New York Times.
Also, a female British translator, whose identity is known to
The New York Times, but who spoke on the condition of anonymity,
was said to have been cornered by Ahmad at the same event in
Rabat.
She said Ahmad had insisted that she accompany him to his
room.
The British woman was hired to translate at the conference in
Rabat but quit immediately after the encounter with Ahmad and
returned to Britain, where she filed a complaint with the police in
London.
Details of Ahmad’s conduct in Rabat in 2017 are part of a
dossier filed with FIFA’s ethics committee by Amr Fahmy, who had
been the No.2 official under Ahmad until he was ousted this
year.
Meanwhile, FIFA has revealed that it would not comment on any of
the allegations levelled against Ahmad.
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