Burundi, among African nations and, verily so, the world scored first to make history with the Federation of International Football associations (FIFA).
Lydia Nsekera won the match for Burundi and women in football (administration) when she outscored Moya Dodd (Australia), 70 votes,and Sonia Ben-Aime (Turks and Caicos Islands), 38 votes, at the FIFA Congress in Mauritius with 95 votes at the elections for a seat in FIFA’s executive committee. She is therefore the first woman in FIFA’s exco in 109 years.
By this victory, Lydia Nsekera, who is 46 yrs old, will serve a four-term in office. Lydia has quietly been notching firsts with FIFA. She is the first woman to be co-opted into FIFA’s executive committee and this was in 2012.
She has been the Head of the Burundian FA since 2004 and had served as a member of FIFA’s organising committee for the 2008 and 2012 Olympics football tournaments in that sport.
As a member of the International Olympics committee, she also served on the independent governance committee that set up in 2011 to tackle the issue of corruption within FIFA.
With FIFA encouraging gender participation, Nsekera was reported to say: “I am very happy to be the first woman elected. It is important for Africa, it is important for Burundi, it is important for women.
“I will inspire women to believe they can lead and I will support women in member associations.”
A glimpse of her manifesto and focus could be gleaned in her statement that “In the executive committee, we work as a team, but personally I will carry on working in order to have more women as coaches in grassroots football.
“I will push for more women to be elected and ask parents to let their daughters play football.”
