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The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Footballer of the Year 2009 will be announced during a live edition of Fast Track at 1600 gmt on Friday, January 8 2010 on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ World Service.

Voting details and criteria are below.

Nomination process for shortlist

The nominations for the five man shortlist have been drawn up by leading football experts from each of the 52 countries in Africa. This process begans on Monday 2 November and ended on Monday 23rd November. The experts were asked to name three contenders in no order of preference.

They were asked to select their nominations on the following criteria: individual skill; technical ability; teamwork; consistency; impact on results; fair play.

The shortlist will be announced during Fast Track on Monday 30th November (³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ World Service, 1600 GMT). It will also appear on a special World Service website in English, Arabic, French, Swahili, Portuguese, Somali and Hausa.

In the event of a tie in the nomination process the African Footballer of the Year production team reserve the right to extend the shortlist to a maximum of six.

Definition of who is eligible

People are eligible to win the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Footballer of the Year if they are eligible to represent an African country at full international level.

Public Voting

Once the shortlist is published, the award will be decided by public vote. The public may vote either online through the websites or by text.
This voting process will run from 1700 GMT on Monday November 30th to 1700 GMT on Monday 4th January 2009.
The number of online votes will be added to the number of text votes and the full list of votes polled by each nominee will be available on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Footballer of the Year website along with all terms and conditions. In the unlikely event that there is a tie, the award would be shared.

Public vote - Terms and conditions

1. This competition is administered by the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ and the award meets the requirements of the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ’s code of conduct on competitions, which can be found on ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ's code of conduct for competitions.

2. The winner will receive an inscribed trophy and be awarded the title ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Footballer of the Year 2009.

3. The shortlist for the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Footballer of the Year will have been drawn up by a panel of football experts from all 52 African countries.

4. The criteria on which the shortlist will have been drawn up is as follows: individual skill, technical ability, teamwork, consistency, impact on results and fair play.

5. The shortlist will be put to the public vote via SMS text and through the . You can vote using either method.

6. The number to call for each contender will be revealed on Fast Track on Friday, 30th November 2009 just before 1700 GMT. In the UK, text messages will be charged at the standard rate of your service provider. Charges for other countries may vary, so please check with your network provider. Please be sure you carefully dial only the number of the nominee you wish to vote for. You must obtain the bill payer’s permission before voting.

7. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ will only ever use your personal details for the purposes of administering this vote and will not publish them or provide them to anyone without your permission. If you would like to know more about the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ’s privacy policy, please see the here.

8. The deadline for voting is 1700 GMT on Monday 4th January 2010. Please do NOT call before the lines open, or after the lines have closed, as your vote will not be counted, but you may still be charged.

9. The decision of the vote is final and no correspondence will be entered into.

10. The prize must be taken as stated and cannot be deferred. There will be no cash alternatives. There will be no prize for voting.

11. In the event of the public vote resulting in a tie, the Award will be awarded jointly.

12. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ, its sub-contractors, subsidiaries and/or agencies cannot accept any responsibility whatsoever for any technical failure or malfunction or any other problem with any telephone network or line, internet access, system, server, provider or otherwise which may result in any vote being lost or not properly registered or recorded.

13. No ineligible entries will be considered. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ reserves the right to disqualify votes if it has reasonable grounds to suspect that fraudulent voting has occurred or if it considers there has been a deliberate attempt to manipulate the result

14. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ reserves the right to cancel this vote at any stage, if deemed necessary in its opinion, and if circumstances arise outside of its control. In the event of any such cancellation or suspension, a technical failure or any other malfunction with the phone vote, the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ reserves the right to arrange for the winner to be decided by a contingency arrangement involving the 52 football experts from Africa.

15. Those taking part in this vote are deemed to have accepted these rules and to agree to be bound by them.

16. All voting will be overseen by ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ African Productions and the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ World Service Future Media and Technology.

17. The ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ reserves the right to disqualify a nominee or withhold an award if it considers, at its absolute discretion, that to proceed with that nominee or award risks bringing the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ into disrepute.

18. These rules are subject to the laws of England and Wales.