04:56 p.m Apr 27, 1999 Eastern

ACCRA, April 27 (Reuters) - Ghana has withdrawn its bid to stage the 2006 World Cup finals, the president of its football association said on Tuesday.

Alhija Djawulah told Reuters that the Ghana Football Association had decided to withdraw the bid after world soccer's governing body FIFA made clear that co-hosting in Africa was not an option at present.

``Co-hosting is not an option to be considered until there is more experience with the phenomenon of co-hosting,'' he said.

Ghana was keen to co-host the event with regional neighbours Ivory Coast and Nigeria and South Africa, Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia and Cameroon. Djawulah said that Ghana now backed South Africa's bid to host the competition.