Ghana’s sports minister discussed the possibility of jointly hosting the World Cup with West African neighbours.
Ghana’s Minister of Sports and Recreation, Kofi Adams, recently floated the idea of a World Cup jointly hosted by the three West African football behemoths of Nigeria, Ghana, and Côte d’Ivoire.
The global showpiece was hosted in Africa for the first and most recent time in 2010, when South Africa received the world. Twenty years after that date, another African country, located up north this time, will host the World Cup, as Morocco has been named as part of the three main host countries for the 2030 World Cup, which will be held across six nations.
What Kofi Adams said
The 2030 Mundial will be the biggest World Cup tournament, at least in terms of the number of host countries. Three South American countries – Paraguay, Argentina and Uruguay – will host three matches as part of the competition’s centenary celebrations.
The remaining games will then be hosted across Europe and Africa, between Spain, Portugal and Morocco. This six-nation hosting affair will follow the 2026 three-nation World Cup, which will be played across the USA, Mexico and Canada.
Hence, Adams views FIFA’s current habit of spreading hosting rights across countries as an opportunity for West Africa to host the global showpiece.
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Cote D’Ivoire recently hosted AFCON 2023. || IMAGO / Shengolpixs
“They [FIFA] are beginning to adopt a number of nations doing it, so maybe, who knows, the next one would be Ghana, Nigeria, and then Côte d’Ivoire coming together to also host the World Cup, and it will be good,” he said, per Modern Ghana.
“I believe that we, together with Nigeria and Côte d’Ivoire, who have already invested quite a lot because they hosted AFCON not too long ago. We can also make a strong case to host.”
Saudi Arabia has already won the hosting rights for the 2034 edition of the World Cup, which means any plan for a joint bid from the West African countries must target 2038 or later.