REVEALED: The 11 African Countries that Voted Against Morocco’s 2026 World Cup Bid

The United States, Canada and Mexico will host the 2026 World Cup after their joint bid beat Morocco’s in the recently concluded 68^th FIFA conference in Moscow.

Of the 211 FIFA member nations, the United 2026 bid was selected by 134 member countries compared to Morocco’s 65.

After the vote, African officials gathered around their President Ahmed in surprise scanning through the list of voters to see which countries didn’t vote for Morocco.

Liberia, South Africa, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, Botswana, Cape Verde, Zimbabwe, Benin were the eleven African countries that opted to vote against Morocco.

According to their bid ambassador Daniel Amokachi, Morocco fans felt betrayed by these close Africans and Arab countries but that isn’t deterring their dream of hosting the World Cup one day.

“The determination of my country to continue and work for football.. ..and realise our dream of one day hosting the World Cup.” he told reporters after the loss.

“We were hopeful but, at the end of the day, if you lose a certain number of votes from your own continent, and some of our Arab brothers, who flipped coins, then you have no chance.”

“Their offer was based on dollars while Morocco is an offer that was based on passion.” he added

Morocco’s close Arab allies Lebanon, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Jordan, Iraq and Bahrain also surprised many by voting against the side they had openly supported. The members were probably persuaded by the promise of record crowds, record revenues and the $11 billion in profit to be made by FIFA.

This is the fifth time Morocco is putting in bids to host the biggest football showdown on earth. After four disappointing attempts in 1994, 1998, 2006 and 2010, this year’s vote had somewhat restored hope for the football loving nation.

The 2026 edition will be the biggest tournament World Cup so far with over 48 teams playing 80 matches over 3 days.

It will be a historic tournament with many firsts. It will be the first tournament to be hosted by three countries, the first to have a 48-team-format and has already been the first to be decided by FIFA’s entire membership.