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FORMER Orlando Pirates coach Augusto Palacios says newly-appointed Caf president Patrice Motsepe must find ways to deal with the issue of age-cheating in African football.

Although the problem is not only exclusive to this continent, it remains a big headache for African football.

Last year, Zimbabwe, Eswatini, Botswana and Comoros Island were disqualified from the Cosafa men’s Under-17 Championship for fielding over-aged players.

“I think with Patrice the first thing should be about youth development in Africa,” Palacios tells KickOff.com.

“To clean this thing of cheating of the age. For youth development and clubs and national team it needs to be great. He needs to create a new competition you see like Cosafa has. You can’t have Cosafa alone. But congratulations to him it’s a good achievement you know, it’s beautiful because we’ve been always controlled by Morocco, Egypt, Algeria, now it’s different.

“We must eliminate this thing of having Cosafa this side, North Africa this side, the Arab this side . . . No we must be unified. You know he can create competition among Africa. For example, he must say, “The Cosafa winner plays North winners from the likes of North, West, East Africa. And then they can play in the Final. Why only Cosafa should have a competition? You are champions of Cosafa and then what happens?” — KickOff