Gabon football coach appointed by the BBC report in sexual abuse prohibited by FIFA

More should be done to make Gabonese football safer, said the union of FIFPRO players after a former youth coach convicted by sexually abuse players received a life ban from the governing body of world football, FIFA.

On Tuesday, FIFA ruled that Patrick Assnoumou Eyi, who was chief coach of Gabon’s national youth teams for decades, had sexually abused multiple young people throughout his career.

Eyi had been appointed in a 2023 Ocular Research of the BBC Africa on the generalized accusations of abuse that affects Gabonese football.

In the investigation, a former Gabonese international said that Eyi had the “position of a god”, since he had the power to decide who would play for Gabon’s youth teams.

Eyi, widely known as Capello, was “only one of several people in Gabonese football that exploded his power with impunity,” Fifpro said in a statement on Wednesday.

Although the union welcomed the decision of the FIFA to ban the former coach of all football -related activities, he said that football in the country of Central Africa would not be safe until “all perpetrators and those who enable them are taken before justice.”

Eyi had admitted positions of rape, preparation and exploitation of young players after the United Kingdom first reported the accusations. Guardian newspaper in 2021.

The FIFA Independent Ethics Committee launched its investigation into EYI later that year.

In addition to being forbidden for life, Eyi has been fined with one million Swiss francs (£ 880,000; $ 1.1m). He is currently being held in prison.

“The research on Mr. EYI refers to the complaints of at least four male soccer players who accused him of sexual abuse between 2006 and 2021. Most of these incidents occurred while the players were minors,” said FIFA’s statement.

One of Eyi’s alleged victims, who wanted to remain in anonymity, told the BBC on Wednesday that he was happy with the prohibition.

“But, on the other hand, I am not satisfied because I do not want us to stop there. It is a complete network, a system that needs to be dismantled, with many predators running free,” they said.

In 2023, the BBC Africa spoke more than 30 witnesses who told a network of sexual abuse that had affected all levels of Gabóne football for three decades.

A victim said he was abused when he was a teenager in a football camp with children under 17. Another, who played for the National Gabon team for several years, said he was attacked from the age of 14.

Together with the perpetrators of abuse, the governing bodies such as FIFA and the National Football Federation of Gabón, FEGAFOOT, have faced accusations that they could not protect young victims.

Both bodies denied the accusations made against them.