2024 USM Alger v RS Berkane football matches

[1] The territory of the former Spanish colony of Western Sahara has caused a deep-seated antagonism and general mistrust between Algeria and Morocco that has permeated all aspects of Moroccan-Algerian relations.

This agreement violated a United Nations (UN) resolution that declared all historical claims by Mauritania or Morocco to be insufficient to justify territorial absorption and drew heavy criticism from Algeria.

[3] In this regard, we request the Algerian Football Federation to take all necessary measures to facilitate the release of the equipment in question from customs on an urgent basis in order to avoid disrupting the organizational aspects of the match.

[8][9] The president of the Moroccan club Hakim Benabdellah told CAF officials that there is no match without the jerseys circulating all over the map of the Kingdom of Morocco.

[14][15] Despite the lingering crisis due to the first leg, USM Alger traveled to Morocco on April 26 aboard a private Egyptian plane on a direct flight.

The FAF received a new letter from CAF, notifying a rejection of the appeal lodged after the decision to declare USM Algiers forfeited in the first leg.

[17] During the technical meeting before the match was held in the presence of the leaders of USM Alger and RS Berkane and representatives of the Algerian and Moroccan federations.

The FAF has initiated a procedure to appeal the CAF sanction before the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Lausanne, considering that the Cairo-based body has "validated the Moroccan club's request to wear a jersey with a political message" during the home and away semi-final.

[21] On May 2, CAF designated RS Berkane as finalist of the Confederation Cup and declared to transmit the file to the disciplinary committee for possible other sanctions against the FAF.

[22][23] In their appeal on the merits, the appellants ask the CAS to annul the CAF decision and to rule that the RS Berkane jersey, which the appellants consider to present a political message, contravenes the Laws on the game, the regulations of the CAF and those of FIFA.As part of the arbitration proceedings, the parties are in the process of exchanging their written briefs and the arbitral panel which will be responsible for deciding this case is in the process of being appointed.

[25] On April 23, 2024, the Algerian Football Federation and USM Alger filed a request with the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne through a law firm specializing in this type of case.

[26] On May 2, the CAS announced that it had rejected the request for interim relief to suspend the decision of the CAF appeal jury which validated the use of the RS Berkane jersey, in the absence of a response from the Confederation of African Football.

[27][28] After the Competitions Commission of the Confederation of African Football approved the qualification of RS Berkane for the Confederation Cup final, against the backdrop of a political-judicial conflict which ended in the CAS offices, the Algerian Football Federation is preparing to submit a new request to the CAS, with the aim of temporarily stopping the final scheduled by the Pan-African body in two matches on May 12 and 19.

[29] On May 10, the Lausanne court once again rejected a request from USM Alger to suspend the Confederation Cup final, pending the conclusion of arbitration proceedings with CAF in the RS Berkane affair.

[33][34] On November 13, 2024, the CAS heard the various parties in the so-called jerseys case, namely USM Alger and FAF on one side and RS Berkane, FRMF and CAF on the other.

The Algerian Handball Federation decided to withdraw after confirming that Morocco would participate with a jersey bearing the map including Western Sahara.

The AOC clearly indicated that the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) is a state in itself recognized by the African Union and that the issue is still pending at the level of the United Nations.

According to media sources, the interview focused on the dispute between the FAF, USM Alger, CAF and RS Berkane and which is currently the subject of CAS arbitration.