It comes on the back of South Africa’s Sports Minister Tokozile Xasa recently pressuring the SAFA to switch their backing from Morocco's bid to United 2026. 

SAFA President Danny Jordaan announced last month that South Africa's vote in the 2026 race would go to Morocco in comments published on the governing body's website.

Xasa, however, warned the SAFA not to "go against the mandate of a country" by supporting the Moroccan bid.

South Africa and Morocco were involved in a diplomatic row in 2004 and tensions between the two countries have still not fully healed.

Morocco withdrew its ambassador from Pretoria in 2004 when South Africa recognised the independence of the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic, also known as the Western Sahara.

The SAFA had earlier backtracked on Jordaan's claim, insisting "no decision has been taken at this stage on the matter on who to support" in the race, where Morocco is taking on a joint bid from the United States, Canada and Mexico.

The governing body added that a choice would be made by its Executive Committee.

Officials from Morocco 2026 have repeatedly clashed with FIFA in recent months following claims world football's governing body changed the scoring system just 24 hours before the African nation submitted their bid in an attempt to hamper their efforts.

Morocco's bid was also at the centre of an ethics investigation into FIFA secretary general Fatma Samoura, over an alleged undeclared family link with former Senegal international El Hadji Diouf.

Samoura was quickly cleared of any wrongdoing after the claim she is related to Diouf, a Morocco 2026 ambassador.

The latest row saw FIFA turn down a request from Morocco that four countries governed by the US - American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands - be prevented from casting a vote.

FIFA’s response, seen by insideworldfootball, states: "Any further questions arising in this context will be dealt with at the 68^th Congress in Moscow in accordance with the regulatory framework."

The letter is signed by Samoura.

Royal Moroccan Football Federation President Fouzi Lekjaa, meanwhile, has written to all 207 FIFA voting nations to plea for their support.

"The choice of the host country cannot only be determined by the capacity of a stadium or the economic maturity of a country but this choice must take into account the capacity of the World Cup to help promote the social and economic development of country and a whole continent," his letter states, as reported by insideworldfootball.

"The honour of organising the biggest global sports competition cannot only be reserved for a small number of countries."

Among the backers of Morocco’s bid is Barcelona star Andres Iniesta, who scored the winning goal for Spain in the 2010 FIFA World Cup final against The Netherlands.

Al Bawaba Sport reports that Moroccan environmental activist Saad Abid was recently in Barcelona, where he met Iniesta.

Abid is now participating in a 26-day challenge to promote Morocco’s bid around 26 countries.

He begun his campaign with Morocco 2026 World Cup bid ambassador Samuel Eto'o in Turkey, and the Cameroonian nominated his former Barcelona team-mate Iniesta to come on board.

"Morocco is a big country and more so it is close to mine," Iniesta, whose country Spain has expressed its support for the bid, was quoted as saying by Morocco World News.

"Unfortunately, I have not visited there much but I intend to take the time for that."

Iniesta has in turn nominated his Spain team-mate and Manchester United goalkeeper David De Gea and former Barcelona colleague Ronaldinho, a World Cup winner with Brazil in 2002, to suggest other players to back Morocco.

It was announced earlier this week that FIFA will reveal whether the Moroccan and joint North American bids for the 2026 World Cup have progressed to the voting stage just over two weeks before it takes place at the Congress in Moscow. 

Morocco 2026 and United 2026 are set to learn their fate when the Evaluation Task Force, which has assessed both bids for the tournament, delivers its verdict on May 29.

The Congress is scheduled for June 13, the day before the opening match of the 2018 World Cup between hosts Russia and Saudi Arabia in Moscow.

The Task Force has inspected the two candidacies for the World Cup and has the power to exclude either bid if they do not meet their requirements.

A second visit had to be conducted to Morocco as the inspectors "noticed some deviations from the initial planned programme" during the first trip to the African country.

Another inspection of the joint bid from the US, Canada and Mexico was not deemed necessary and the United 2026 effort remains the favourite at this stage.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino is thought to prefer the combined North American candidacy, largely due to the amount of money a World Cup in the region could generate.

United 2026 recently claimed a North American 2026 World Cup would produce profits of "nearly $11 billion (£8 billion/€9 billion)" for FIFA.

Infantino has also been accused of trying to undermine Morocco 2026 by asking the Task Force to deliberately find fault with the African bid.