Hayatou denied Mikel African award — Father

Pa Michael Obi, the father of the Chelsea star, Mikel, has blamed the President of the Confederation of African Football, Mr. Isa Hayatou for his son’s failure to win the African Footballer of the Year award.

The CAF/GLO African award was given to Yahaya Toure, with Mikel and Didier Drogba finishing in second and third places respectively.

He said not only he, but all Nigerians, were just waiting for the pronouncement of Mikel as the winner, adding that his friends from Jos and Lagos were just on the wings waiting to call and congratulate him before the name of Yaya was announced.

Pa Obi, who spoke in an exclusive interview with our correspondent in Jos on Wednesday, said that the CAF president had always exhibited a dislike for footballers from Anglophone to those from the Francophone countries.

He however said that the family was not perturbed that their scion did not get the award because of their firm belief in God and that at God’s own appointed time, Mikel will get the award. He said that the fact that Mikel congratulated the winner immediately and flew back to his base without any complaint was reflections of the family’s belief in the hands of God in the destiny of man.

He said, “We know that it was he, Issa Hayatou that denied him that award. Yaya himself said so that his friend was worthy to take the award.

“We were there; all gathered around the television watching what was happening and I saw all that happened. Some friends had started phoning me from Lagos and Jos, especially from Lagos, waiting to say congratulations to me because everybody had in mind that Mikel would be the person to win the award. 

But I think with Hayatou, the CAF president, it became impossible. Not that I think, he did it because some papers wrote to him that since he had been on that seat, Nigeria had not enjoyed such things.

“But all I know is that I am somebody who does not get worried about certain things. If you observe, you can see what I have written on our transport vehicles, ‘God’s Time is the Best’,” Pa Obi said.

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