2021 AFCON: God told me to end the match between Tunisia vs Mali – Referee Janny Sikazwe

Referee in Mali vs Tunisia match suffered sunstroke

Social media users react to strange refereeing in Mali vs Tunisia game

Mali beat Tunisia 1-0 in Group F

Janny Sikazwe, the Zambian referee who was at the centre of the controversial Africa Cup of Nations game between Mali and Tunisia has finally broken his silence over the much-talked-about scandal.

Referee Janny Sikazwe became the most popular match official in the ongoing AFCON for the wrong reasons after ending the opening Group F match between Mali and Tunisia prematurely.

The Gambian referee who ended the game prematurely twice in the 85th minute and the 89th has revealed that God instructed him to end the game in order to save his life.

“The doctors told me my body was not cooling down. It would have been just a little time before [I would have gone] into a coma, and that would have been the end. I think God told me to end the match. He saved me.”

“I have seen people going for duties outside the country and come back in a casket, I was very close to coming back like that. I was lucky I didn’t go into a coma. It would have been a very different story,” Janny Sikazwe told the BBC in an interview.

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He was reported to have experienced sunstroke whiles officiating the game between Mali and Tunisia.

Meanwhile, the Confederation of African Football did not sanction Janny Sikawe due to his health condition’s as he returned as a Video Assistant Referee (VAR) five days after the incident in the Gabon versus Morocco group stage game.