Going Rotten in FIFA: The World of Football Corruption

We are transfixed by the obvious. If WikiLeaks divulges documents that reveal commonly known antipathies between states, the guardians of the world’s worst kept secrets have little to do but squeal and condemn. ‘Principles’ become important. Prosecution becomes paramount.

So, is the BBC Panorama program on FIFA, aired on Monday, overegging an already putrid pudding? Trading votes has taken place in the past. Officials have been bribed. This episode was particularly juicy, making the claims that FIFA executives Ricardo Teixeira, Issa Hayatou and Nicolas Leoz had received money from International Sport and Leisure (ISL), a sport marketing firm which had been awarded World Cup rights. To this can be added Jack Warner of Trinidad and Tobago and his ticket fiddling, completing this less than scrupulous gang of four.

These officials are certainly not the lowest on the rung. Leoz of Paraguay is head of South America’s football confederation. Teixeira is head of the Brazilian Football Confederation responsible for staging the 2014 World Cup. Hayatou is one of FIFA’s vice-presidents, the bureaucratic face of African football. Warner is another of the body’s vice presidents.

These came in the form of 175 payments totaling $100 million. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was also netted, largely because Hayatou has also been a member of that less than squeaky clean body. It is pressing the BBC to hand over the relevant proof. FIFA remains satisfied that previous investigations revealed nothing untoward in the dealings with ISL.

The timing was certainly poor for bidding countries hoping to make their claims for hosting the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. Candidates who had marshaled their bids were caught off guard, being shown to be compliant in the face of extortionate demands made by that expansive reptile of the world’s most popular sport. The English FA was peeved, arguing that the investigation had been an ‘embarrassment to the BBC’ and irrelevant to the bidding process. The British Prime Minister David Cameron has proven indifferent to the allegations, preferring to focus on England’s bid.

It makes little sense to assume that Panorama should have revealed its findings till after the bid. The process of selection is rotten to the core. BBC executive editor Clive Edwards was certainly in the right on this one. ‘I’m not prepared to sit on information we have. I believe that it is in everyone’s interest that there should be a fair process and that corruption should be exposed’ (BBC, Nov 30).

Suggestions abound here as to how to deal with an organization that has often jeopardized the mission of promoting football in favour of political intrigue and self-enrichment. Various countries might pull out of the organization altogether. The absence of heavy weight nations in the game of football might pose a frontal attack on the cadres of FIFA. But this doesn’t answer one vital problem: that numerous foot balling federations are themselves riddled with corrupt representatives. Like begets like. For FIFA to change, the entire institutional structure of football’s bureaucracy must change with it.

Binoy Kampmark was a Commonwealth Scholar at Selwyn College, Cambridge. He lectures at RMIT University, Melbourne. Email: bkampmark@gmail.com

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