South Africa, Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe have put in bids to jointly host the 2028 Africa Cup of Nations finals, a proposal that would mark a first for the competition in terms of four countries staging the showpiece together on one occasion. It is a rare model for African football, but not one without precedent across major international tournaments.
Botswana Football Association president Tariq Babitseng confirmed that his country’s bid was submitted within the deadline and said the federation is optimistic about securing the hosting rights. Speaking in Harare, he added that the timing and readiness of the application reflect a clear intention to bring the finals to southern Africa.
CAF has not announced any formal schedule for rotating the tournament’s host regions. Still, the pattern of recent editions suggests a geographic balance has been a key consideration: the last three finals have taken place in central, west and north Africa, while the 2027 edition is set to be co-hosted by Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania in the east. With that sequence, the southern region may feel it has a stronger claim to the next opportunity.
“We submitted on time to host the tournament in southern Africa,” Babitseng told reporters in Harare, where he was elected the new president of the Council of Southern Africa Football Associations (COSAFA), the largest of CAF’s six zonal unions. “We have the transport routes and the infrastructure to host a successful tournament.”
The southern African quartet already has experience working around multi-nation staging arrangements, with South Africa, Namibia and Zimbabwe set to co-host the 2027 Cricket World Cup next year.
Although having four countries jointly host a continental finals tournament is unusual, it has happened elsewhere in international sport. The 2020 European Championship was distributed across 11 countries, and England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland are scheduled to co-host the 2028 edition. In the Asian region, the 2007 Asian Cup was played in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam.
Within the Africa Cup of Nations itself, South Africa—who have hosted in 1996 and again in 2013—are the only southern African nation to have previously welcomed the tournament, alongside Angola, which hosted in 2010.
