Ethiopia Football Federation (EFF) has a new leader in Esayas Jira.
The 46-year-old tallied 87 of the total 145 votes, from the General Assembly held in Semera town on Sunday, 3rd June 2018.
During the first poll, Jira beat Assefaw, outgoing president Juneidi Basha and the outsider Tesfaye Kahesaye – but a Fifa representative deemed the election illegitimate after Jira failed to win a majority vote.
In the re-run later in the day, Jira secured a landslide victory over Assefaw as Kahesaye and Basha resigned their candidatures.
Four candidates, Juneidi Basha, the incumbent, his former vice-president Taka Assefaw, Jira, who is also the president of the Ethiopian Premier League side Jimma Aba Jifar Football Club and Tesfaye Kassaye challenged for the top seat.
Jira, who banked on support of clubs from the larger Oromia and Southern Ethiopia regions, won the first round of voting with 66 votes.
Taka, who was being supported by clubs from Northern Ethiopia and the capital Addis Ababa, came second with 47 votes; Basha was a distant third with 28 votes, while Tesfaye managed a paltry three votes.
Quoted by the BBC Sport, Jira noted;
I am so overjoyed. After a long, overdue and rocky journey we put an end to this nightmare. I am just elated
On four different times, the Ethiopia Football Federation presidential elections had been postponed by FIFA.
The election took eight months to conclude, after FIFA ordered Ethiopia to make changes to its electoral process in a bid to bring it in line with FIFA statutes.
Esayas worked as a football administrator for the last 20 years, and most recently has been working as general manager at Ethiopian Premier League outfit, Jimma Aba Jifar FC.
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) President Ahmad Ahmad has congratulated the new leader and assured him of Caf’s commitment to co-operate with the Ethiopia Federation.
Cecafa Region Football Heads
1 Eritrea – (Tesfaye Gebreyessus)
2 South Sudan – (Francis Amin)
3 Ethiopia – (Esayas Jira)
4 Sudan – (Dr Kamal Shaddad)
5 Djibouti – (Souleiman Hassan Waberi)*
6 Somalia – (Abdulgani Said Arab)*
7 Zanzibar – (Ravia Idarous Faina)
8 Tanzania – (Wallace Karia)*
9 Burundi – (Révérien Ndikuriyo)
10 Rwanda – (Brig Gen Jean Damascène Sekamana)
11 Uganda – (Moses Magogo)
12 Kenya – (Nicholas Mwendwa)
*Cecafa Executive Committee
