CAF President Patrice Motsepe backs Gianni Infantino for another term at FIFA.

Very good question and that's why I uh the media is so critically critically important because uh whether it's in business or football or I don't know even in church or or in politics and uh and in the economy it's important that you ask these questions. We have a duty to answer them as best we can because we we also have a duty to report to the hundreds of millions of football spectators and fans on the continent. I must say I was very uh I was emotional when uh I heard what uh the Somali referee Omar said to me and uh from your and and I was also emotional but he was excited because we said to him you are now going to be the referee of uh the biggest club competition in Europe. And I really want to thank uh Sephin and thank uh the UEFA for uh the discussions and for this opportunity. I uh I'm clear in my mind because uh the the issue of the circumstances under which a country either allows somebody to come in or not to come in. We've had lots of those challenges. We had the same challenges in other countries on the continent in football and uh and there it's a sovereign issue. uh they've got their laws and their requirements. My job and my duties is to make sure that u that we are there to support the Somali referee Omar and and he he's our best we gave him an award as our best referee on the continent. We are proud of him and uh and we will keep on supporting him and all the other referees. uh talking about Gianni uh you know what is more important is not is more what we discuss in private and and uh it's important for me I always look at the heart of a person how we are all human we all have uh weaknesses and frailties and we all make mistakes and I think I make more mistakes than than anybody else but what I like is is is the deep love for football uh the deep commitment to football in the world by Gianni the support for Africa and uh and and we did that some of the issues that we have discussed including some of the issues that that you have raised and uh and I'm satisfied that he's always shown the deepest commitment the deepest commandment. You know, there are rules in FIFA and uh we all have to to respect those rules. I was laughing when he said that sometimes the FIFA judicial bodies makes decisions that he doesn't like. I thought he got that from me because the CF judicial bodies sometimes take decisions that I don't like at all. But I've got to keep quiet and support them because their dependency is critically critically important and they have to know that they must take decisions that has got nothing to do with whether the president of football supports a girl support and and the people in FIFA who took the decisions you refer to. I've been exposed to, you know, you see the CDs, there are some people there with enormous integrity and uh I think the issue for us now is uh is is to make sure that uh uh that we because public perception is everything for all of us. You know, I can stand as a president of G. I mean uh let me give you the the FC code every four years but I know that I'm I'm giving them the same FC code as it is now every 2 years identical but I'm doing something else and giving them something different every four years but it doesn't matter what I say and this is the point you made Mark very important it's what ordinary football people and not as football people and non- football people on the continent what their perception is of what we do and it's important that Kev and and I know that FIFA as well we're all committed to make sure that in the minds and in the perspectives of ordinary people in Africa and worldwide we are seen as an organization that upholds governance and ethics at the highest levels I'm going to be more brief because that's a very important question to ask and I have to try and give as much explanation as possible. So the next questions the answer is going to be yes no yes no

I hope is a is a lady cuz you must give ladies time as well

But it's very good question and u uh I think we we if we receive any request we've got to look at it and and discuss uh within XCO and EXCO is the most authoritative the most senior body in K and we have a duty to look at every proposal and uh and take decisions based on what's in the best interest of football. So, I think I've answered you now. [laughter] Thank you. What more do you want me to say? Yeah. I hope you you are happy with what I said. What do you want me to say? Expand. Expand. I've expanded as much as I can. Let me be more direct. Decisions of this nature have to be looked at by XCO and XCO has to take the decision and we have a duty to look at every proposal that we receive. So uh the secretary general is not here that proposal will be submitted to XCO to look at and to take decisions based on what's in the best interest of football. It's it's it's our duty to to to do that. Thank you very much. Next question.

That was your passport. So uh and I must say I'm very proud of those heads of state of those three countries because that uh Madame Sunulu and President R and President deep commitment and excitement to make sure that uh the Afcon is enormously successful. I mean the president of football in Uganda said to me we have never had so many people visit Uganda as what happened last year during the football competition called the CH. So immediately the country sees wow the hotels are full, the airplanes are full, people buy food, the restaurants are full. I don't want the hospitals to be full. But there's money, jobs are being created. That's the money going around, that's developing the economy. That's excellent. So I can assure you, we've had discussions, there's discussion as I said of ensuring that you apply for a visa or as I don't want to conclude because we will make announcements, but the objective is to make sure that it allows our football fans to move around as quickly and as freely as possible. I was in LA. I went to watch one of the football matches and as I left, one of the people I haven't seen since I last saw you when I was working in America many many years ago and he said to me we are going to come, I'm bringing my whole family, we're going to come and watch the football in Kenya and what we are going to do is we're going to go on safari. So we're going to link our watching of football with taking the family on safari. Beautiful because he's not the only one. I've heard many other people say that the whole palo and pommoja is going to be enormously successful. But thanks for the question.

Yeah. Now there are certain things you must be careful about being persuaded. There are certain things you should never be persuaded about. And nobody is going to persuade me to serve more than two terms in CAF. It's not going to happen. And we took a decision to support and I personally support Infantino. He's not just a good friend, he's a loyal friend. He's loyal to Africa. And again, I come from a different background where when people have been loyal to you, you never stab them in the back. You never do that. And as I said, to help in Africa that excites me. FIFA doesn't need me. So nobody's going to be able to persuade me to change my views on those things because but also because there are other people who are very good and who will do a good job. We've got to be careful that we don't start focusing too much on certain individuals. Everybody makes a contribution but this country has raised your hand and become president of whatever you want to. And you used to write beautiful articles about me, you know. But I'm just saying that CAF would be fine, African football will be fine even when I'm not there. And that's part of what I'm focusing on. Everything else where I've had the honor of making a humble contribution, part of the job is to make sure that there are better people than me when I was there to take over and they bring new leadership and new focus, but overall that's good for football. But thanks for those questions and I'll go to the league behind you afterwards and then the BBC at the back there.

You know Mark Leon?

Very good question. You know, until an African country wins the World Cup, there will always be doubt. Ultimately, that was the version of what we were saying. So we have received so much respect for how the African countries played and we have to look at the psyche of our country as well. And this is so important. The psyche of our country and the psyche of the continent. There's so much for us to be proud about, to be inspired by, and look at the good. You'll always find good and sadly you'll also always find weaknesses and challenges and people look at how we failed in the past and say we are destined to fail forever. We come from a country where they said there was going to be civil war and we come from a difficult path, but I think the feedback I've received from top football leaders in the world is that the Africans made us proud and they could have done even better. I mean, we were leading 2-0 against Argentina. If we just told the ref, we can't tell the ref to stop the game. But we will learn. So we've gained so much more respect and recognition and I can tell you at the next World Cup, I will not be in football. I will not be in CAF anymore when the next World Cup happens. I'll go to Morocco as an ordinary football spectator and fan. But Africa will do even better. Even better.

I will thank you.

Brilliant, brilliant question. Correct. Brilliant. And what is the allocation? Thank you. I mean just listening to you something went through my mind. I spoke about the Catholic mission school I went to when I was 5 years old and spent 10 years there. They used to wake us up every morning at 6:00 and we had to go to church. Whether you like it or not, you had to go to church. Every night before we went to bed, you had to go to church. For me those were the best 10 years of my life. I like this. It's so important. Values what you believe in, simple things like honesty, integrity, treat the next person the way you would like to be treated, don't lie, don't steal. These things are embedded in God and Allah. It's very important that we all grew up in families where we went to church and we should put God and Jesus Christ at the center of what we do. Now let's go to something that crossed my mind while you were talking. We should have a conference talking about how can people make money out of football and bring all of the football stakeholders. This reminds me of the days when I was president of Navco and would have meetings with thousands of businessmen. There is so much, football is a multi-billion dollar industry. I think the numbers in excess of 300 billion American dollars. We have to have a meeting where the focus is how does African small business, young business, all businesses get involved in football and make a living out of it. One of the things I like enormously about this MP Foundation National Day of Prayer is you've got thousands of hawkers who come the night before at the FNB stadium, prepare food. Some come from KZN, Eastern Cape. Unbelievable. They come just for that day of prayer because they make so much money selling food to our people. So we should look at and I think when there's a football match, our hawkers can sell things as well outside. I'm not talking about the sweets because you spoke about the tickets in America and I spent so much money buying tickets. But those were for the sweets where we had partners and others who we want to support football and sponsor football. But that's a brilliant idea you raised. In everything we do, you must tell the secretary general. The secretary general is in Morocco, acting secretary general. I'm always reminded, please don't say secretary general, he's still acting. He does such wonderful work, he makes me proud. But we should make our events create opportunities for business people to grow their businesses, to partner, to make income. That's a brilliant idea. We should implement it. I've taken a lot of pressure. I'll take the last two or three questions and then we have to close. I'll go with you. Very brief question. The last three questions then afterwards I go to BBC and then I go to the gentleman at the back.

I like what did you say about your name? You know there's so much happened and sometimes one of the things we see, these are things that excite me. We have to provide centers of that increase. In 2011 or something, they asked me to be the first chairman of the BRICS business council of the five countries: China, India, Brazil, South Africa, and Russia. And one of the things we did was just what we are saying, we have to create these centers to allow interaction with the objective of entrepreneurial financial transactions. But we have to make them happen and we will come better and better the more we make them happen. So continue.

Where did you grow up?

I'm so proud of you. You know where is that?

So you raised such good good points.

Thank you so much. I've always liked and various other leaders. The same applies to every other leader who was in the ANC and those who are not part of the ANC, I have enormous respect. The reason why I mentioned Tapbecki is because of what he said about them. I think it's correct to say that what Julia said as well, Julius is my language. Very good. Very, very good. Now, let me clarify two points on this issue of Afrophobia and xenophobia. Illegality in all its forms we will not tolerate. We reject illegality. And that includes illegal migration. I mean, nobody and of course criminality as well. We are totally against illegality in all these forms as well as illegal migration. And that's very clear and we should put that aside. And then there's a separate issue. That separate issue is when people legally come to this country. You know, something weird is happening in other parts of Africa. You come from outside the continent. You're a tourist. We welcome you. You're not coming here to take people's jobs because our job as a country, every country in Africa, your first obligation is your people without a doubt. The number one obligation of the government of South Africa is to create jobs and create a future for its people 100%. And any form of illegality whether by our South Africans or people from outside the continent should not be tolerated at all under any circumstances. You've got to take effective legal action and ensure that there's a huge amount of respect for the law. Non-negotiable. But you know for businessmen like myself, Africa has no future. And we'll talk about it in the context of CAF and football. We have no future as a country. I meet the top businessmen, the top politicians, the top heads of state in the world, have done so for the last 30, 35 years. We have no future if we don't partner with the continent. And it's politically unpopular to go and educate our people to say to them that we are all Africans. And Africans means whether you're white or black or green or whatever, we are Africans. And we are enriched by the different cultures, the different languages, the different ways, the multi-racial, multicultural appearances of our people. But you will never be able to create the jobs that we need in this country and create a bright future for all our people without taking out the negativity and educating our people to realize that we have to interact with the continent in a manner that is mutually beneficial. I mean something weird happened about 20 years ago when I was hosting, one of my children were being baptized, and we had invited many of our relatives and other guests. And as one of the families were leaving, some guys came in a car and said they wanted to rob them. And they said, we see that you are South African and because you are South African, we are not going to rob you. I mean there should be no robbing at all, but we thought that you were foreigners and because we thought you were foreigners we wanted to rob you. So you know, and that's why young people like yourself and others, the concern about our people not getting jobs is a legitimate concern and we've got a duty to do that. And of course that's also an equally illegitimate concern when some of our businesses don't employ South Africans but employ people from outside the continent because they are prepared to accept low wages. But we will do the right thing and educate our people and say to them that illegality will not be tolerated and we will also from CAF we will issue those statements. We have to say we support the cooperation, the working together of Africans on the continent. We will not tolerate, we cannot support illegality. We cannot support illegal migration. Because all over the world, and some of the leaders are correct when they raise issues to say that if we try and create jobs in those countries, forget about people from outside South Africa. If you don't create jobs in Limpopo, you don't create jobs in town, you don't create jobs in Eastern Cape, people will leave the rural areas and come to the cities because they need jobs. So we need to work together to try and create jobs in the countries in our neighboring countries and in other countries on the continent. Okay, let's go back. CAF will issue a statement to say that we support legality. We do not support illegality in all its forms and we fully appreciate that and support and recognize that the duties of every government starts with its own citizens to create jobs and to create a future for its citizens. But we should stop this intolerance and prejudice and violence against our own people just because they come from outside the continent or outside our countries. So that's why we don't want to go into politics because we've got to at times stand for what is ethically and morally correct. And they say, 'Yeah, but you're going to lose votes.' If you lose votes for what is ethically and morally and principle and in line with our religious convictions and upbringing, then lose the votes. That's what we should teach our children.

Good question. Good question. Now I have this difficult question. I have to go to Mali. I've been there and the military was in control. But I went there because of football. I have to go to Burkina Faso. And some of the African heads said don't go there because there's a military junta there. I have to go to Niger. And some of the heads of state say don't go there because there's a military leadership. But I think we've got to deal with reality and of course democracy and freedom of speech and regular elections that's non-negotiable and that's critical. But I will be visiting those countries to engage on the football part. And of course the decision as to where the Afcon will go is the decision of the EXCO. There are so many presidents who say to me they think I have the power to decide magic that Afcon is going to go to a certain country. I don't want that power. Because part of my duty is also to create a culture where CAF functions in a manner that reflects ethics and governance and transparency but also global best practices. So we don't know at this stage where the Afcon is going in 28, 32, and 36. Niger and Mali will have as good a chance as everybody else. They are not going to be disadvantaged or prejudiced by the fact that their military junta. But you raise a very important point, the questions of safety and security, and those are questions that we will have to address. But there's no decision that has been taken as to where it will go. But it's a very good question. Okay, last question will come from the pair.

A very good question because you see we have to work with the rest of the world and the rest of the world includes countries in Europe and in America or countries in North America and in Latin America and in Asia. So that proposal will be looked at in the context of any other proposal. But I can tell you the standards are very high, very high. We have to be convinced that there will be free movement of our fans and spectators and supporters in and out. We have to be convinced, and this applies to every country, that our fans and our guests will be safe, will be protected by the police and everybody else. Good infrastructure because it's also a moment to strengthen the ties between our people on the continent as well as between Africa and the rest of the world. So those countries are members of CAF, they've come to put in the bid, we've got to look at it. We've got to look at the infrastructure. We have to as an independent entity that has to go there and make a report. They'll come back and say the stadiums are good or not good, the hospitals and the hotels and all of those infrastructural requirements. And sometimes football can just be the tool to bring people together. Of course I can't talk in public what I discussed privately with the head of state, but part of my duties is to the people in the country and not just the football supporters. And the commitment that all of us have to democracy, freedom of speech, freedom of association, and the sort of fundamental principles that are important for us on the continent. Right. Thank you very much, President.

Very good question because I, you know, when there's an art, I have an opportunity to meet with the referees. I maybe see them once or maybe twice a year and that's an opportunity to do two things. Number one, to emphasize that we want them to have a future in football where they earn good money, can create a future, to diminish or even eliminate the chances of corruption. And it's also an opportunity for me to hear from them what are we not doing well as CAF, what are the areas where we should improve, as well as areas where they're happy that we're making progress. So it became clear to me that to be a referee at the FIFA World Cup is an honor and they earn good money. And we've also in CAF significantly increased what they earn and we still can do more and we will do more. So when I saw that, it really saddened me because I gave him an award last year on behalf of the 54 CAF member associations as our top referee. Excellent referee. And it was necessary to try and ameliorate the experiences he had. And that's why I said I want to thank you APA and thank President Zeppelin for the partnership. And he will be the referee in the champions of the two champions of the two club competitions in Europe at the highest level. It's a great honor for me, for Africa, for African referees, and it's a great honor for him as well. And what made me happy is to hear him laugh. You can't hear people smiling, but you can hear them laugh and be happy over the phone and express so much joy. And so very happy and we will keep supporting and assisting our referees because we are very proud of him as much as we are proud of every one of the referees on the African continent. Merci, thank you very much. Yo.