Football - Cameroon: Elite one raises dust on match day 1
After several months of uncertainty, Cameroon's MTN Elite 1 football championship finally kicks of on Saturday January 24 in Bafang. The rest of the day one matches were played on Sunday with incidents of reported match fixing and controversial refereeing highlighted. Fecafoot has already sanction four referees after just match day one.
Philemon MBALE · Author profile ·
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Cameroonian public was once again thrilled to the excitement at the Bafang Municipal stadium which hosted the launch of the 2025/2026 football season. Locals Unisport of Bafang lost at home to visiting Aigle de la Menoua 2-0 on the opening match.
The rest of the day one fixtures were played on Sunday January 25. Exciting games which produced plenty of controversies across the nation.
In Limbe, Victoria United hosts PWD of Bamenda at the Centenary stadium. The outcome of the game, the homeside wins by 3-0, all three goals scored from the penalty spot. In very questionable terms fans were left with no choice than to leave the stands even before the final whistle. The visitors at one point had some of their players leave the pitch in protest to the third penalty awarded to Opopo.
On the flipside, PWD scored twice but the referees decided otherwise. A red card was awarded to them alongside 5 yellows, something which many saw as bias officiating.
First thing Monday morning, the Secretary General of FECAFOOT, signs a document suspending all four referees who officiated the game in Limbe. The federation equally announced it had opened an investigation to further clarify things but termed the officiating as ''manifestly questionable".
Another similar incident was recorded in Douala where homeside Dynamo came from behind to win 4-2 against AS Fortuna from Yaounde. The federation in their communication equally said an administrative investigation has been opened based on incident reports from the said game.
Many other incidents polluted the effervescence of match day one games:
In Yaounde Canon played a 0-0 tie with visiting Stade Renard from Melong. Visibly the jersey number 10 for the visitors bore the name AKO, clearly that of AKO Alexis who left the club at the end of last season but surprisingly his name and jersey is still in use by another player by name Ramadan Ngoube Abou.
In Bangante, Panthere hosted Fauve Azure and remarkably the visited did not carry the championship's main sponsor MTN on their jerseys as prescribed. The team from Yaounde in justifying their acts said the sponsorship deal with MTN is questionable, seemingly they have not had any money for bearing the telecom giants as main sponsors of the league for some time now.
Unisport 0-2 Aigle Menoua
Canon 0-0 Stade Renard
Dynamo 4-2 AS Fortuna
Gazelle 1-0 Aigle de Moungo
Coton sport 0-0 Colombe
Panthere 2-0 Fauve Azure
Victoria Utd 3-0 PWD