The world football governing body, FIFA has found Ahmad Ahmad, the head of Confederation of African Football, CAF, guilty of corruption charges levelled against him.
The football association on Monday announced five-year suspension of Ahmad.
Ahmad has been the CAF president of since March 2017 and was standing for re-election.
FIFA noted in a statement that Ahmad had “breached his duty of loyalty, offered gifts and other benefits, mismanaged funds and abused his position as the CAF President”.
Ahmad has also been fined 200,000 Swiss francs ($220,000) by FIFA for the misdeeds, which related to “the organisation and financing of an Umrah pilgrimage to Mecca” and his involvement in CAF’s dealings with a sports equipment company.
The 60-year-old, who last week stood down from his post for 20 days after testing positive for coronavirus, can appeal the ban “from all football-related activity” at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
In April 2019 he was accused of a series of offences by former CAF official Amr Fahmy, who informed FIFA in a letter that Ahmad had paid bribes to directors, made personal use of CAF funds, and sexually harassed a number of employees.