The Football Kenya Federation has formally appealed to Confédération Africaine de Football (CAF) to lift the sanction which slashed fans allowed at the Moi International Sports Centre Kasarani to 60 per cent.
Sports Cabinet Secretary Salim Mvurya revealed the new development on Wednesday, August 20, after overseeing final preparations undertaken by the Local Organizing Committee (LOC) for Friday’s quarter-final clash between Kenya and Madagascar.
The CS exuded confidence in the preparations undertaken by LOC, as he confirmed there was a chance fans would be able to attend the game slated for Friday, August 22 in full capacity.
Part of the reason the CS was confident CAF would review the sanction was because there were no incidents during Harambee Stars' last group game against Zambia.
“We did not have any incident that could attract sanctions from CAF and therefore we want to thank the 12th man, the fans, the security team and all stakeholders who played a key role in ensuring a seamless game on Sunday. This affirmation underscores Kenya’s commitment to delivering a safe and world-class tournament experience,” Mvurya said.
In addition to the potential lifting of the sanction, Mvurya also announced that the fan zones would be increased to 13 across Nairobi "to give more Kenyans the opportunity to rally behind the Harambee Stars".
The additional fan zones will be located at Ruiru, Dagoretti’s Camp Toyoyo, and at Babadogo.
With the game likely to seek into the night, Mvurya assured that preparations were adequate as the government had strengthened measures to ensure smooth gate operations while also enhancing security. The lighting situation has also been improved.
Harambee Stars, who topped Group A, played all their group matches at the at the Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani. For the opening group games, CAF allowed the stadium to be filled to its 44,000 capacity, but a series of incidents forced the federation to cap the tickets to just 27,000 for the final group game against Zambia.
Ahead of the Madagascar game, there were concerns about whether the tickets would be sufficient amid silence from CAF on the sanctions. The ticketing frenzy reached new heights on Tuesday, when the official ticketing platform Mookh Africa's servers experienced a downtime due to a large volume of accounts trying to acquire tickets.
Mookh has since revealed that they had to secure their servers and temporarily halt purchase of tickets due to the presence of automated bots, which tried to beat genuine fans from acquiring tickets.
On the ticketing issue, Mvurya confirmed that CAF was working to resolve the technical challenges on the online portal, with updates set to be communicated in due course.
