You Can’t Sit with Us. Discrimination against Women in Football: a Commentary of the Mariyam Mohamed vs. Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Elections Case

Abstract

The present paper focuses on the issue of discrimination against women in sports governance. The first part of this paper addresses the issue women discrimination in sports governance through looking into the case of Mariyam Mohamed vs. Asian Football Confederation (AFC) elections, which was recently decided by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). Further, the case analysis will also allow, in the second part of the paper to call the attention to several other malaises affecting sports leadership and decision making, such as the lack of transparency of the CAS decisions and their inability to deliver an effective remedy in situations like the one of Mariyam Mohamed. There was no question, for CAS, of whether the AFC electoral procedures were conducted in breach of the prohibition of discrimination against women and of improper third-party influence. Nevertheless, CAS recognized that it was also powerless to act on it leaving the situation unremedied for the time being, shedding light on a structurally more profound consequence to sports justice and other sports governance bodies modus operandi.

Keywords: discrimination; gender; sports; governance