EGYPT will replace Cameroon as the host of this year’s African Cup of Nations, giving Mohamed Salah a chance to shine on his home stage.

Salah will undoubtedly be the face of the tournament in June and July, but Egypt’s organisers face a tough task to get ready with kick-off only five months away.

Deepening the challenges for the host country, this year’s competition will be the first African championship to be increased from 16 to 24 teams.

The tournament also arrives in Egypt at a time of political unease after years of turmoil following the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

Egypt’s streets have been marred by deadly violence in the years since and it has sometimes spilled over onto the football field.

In 2012, more than 70 fans were killed in a riot at a game in the northern city of Port Said, one of world football’s worst riots. Port Said has been put forward by Egyptian organisers as a venue for this year’s African Cup.

Despite this, African football leaders decided today that Egypt was the best choice, with doubts over whether the competing bid from South Africa, the 2010 World Cup host, had any government approval or financial backing.

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) is based in Cairo, giving the Egyptian bid a logistical advantage.

Cameroon was stripped of hosting rights late last year because of poor preparations and its own political problems, which involve long-running violent clashes between separatist rebels and government forces in western parts of the country close to two of the planned tournament host cities.

It was the fourth straight African Cup of Nations to be switched from its initial host country, with CAF also having to find new venues for its top tournament and money-earner in 2013, 2015 and 2017, all of them for political reasons.

Egypt and South Africa were the only two countries to submit bids to replace Cameroon in a new, rushed hosting process for 2019.

Egypt, which last hosted the African championship in 2006, was chosen after the CAF executive committee met in Dakar, Senegal, yesterday.

The Egypt team are a record seven-time African Cup champions but their football slumped dramatically in the wake of the political turmoil following the ouster of Mubarak.

After winning three titles in a row in 2006, 2008 and 2010, Egypt failed to even qualify for the African Cup in 2012, 2013 and 2015.

The Egyptian team returned in 2017 and with Salah in their ranks made a surprising run to the final before losing to Cameroon.

Egypt has hosted the African Cup four times and won three of those tournaments, making Salah’s team an early favourite to win another this year.

But it’s unclear how the tournament will be greeted in Egypt.

Egyptians are fiercely loyal followers of their national team, and Salah is worshipped as a national hero, but fans have long been associated with fierce protests against the political leadership.

Three years after the Port Said crisis, 22 fans were killed in a stampede that was sparked when police fired tear gas at fans in a military-owned stadium in Cairo.

Hundreds of fans have been arrested in recent years as they took part in anti-government protests, including one in 2013 where protesters torched the headquarters of the Egyptian football federation and vandalised a police social club, and others marking the anniversary of the 2012 Port Said tragedy.

At the height of the political crisis, fans were banned from attending any games in Egypt as the government recognised the threat they posed when they gathered in numbers. That ban has been lifted.

Current Egypt President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, a former army general who took power in 2014, supported the African Cup bid as he attempts to show his country is now safe and stable.

“The political leadership offered its full support to host the Afcon [African Cup of Nations],” sports minister Ashraf Sobhi said.

The Egyptian football federation said on Twitter in a message hailing the decision that Egypt was “a safe country.”