FIFA should turn the page

Just a week ago, on the day of his election as FIFA president for a fifth term, Joseph S. Blatter remarked: “We don’t need revolutions, we need evolutions.” After resuming office he went further and said: “Why would I step down? That would mean I recognise that I did wrong.” However, days later, in a widely welcomed move he resigned, saying the organisation needed a “profound overhaul”. It is unclear what prompted the hard-nosed football administrator, who displayed such Machiavellian ability to stay in control of the body even as it was engulfed in a series of corruption scandals. Whether it was because the noose was tightening around the FIFA general secretary and his second-in-command, Jérôme Valcke, alleged to have authorised $10 million in bribes for World Cup bidding votes, and fears that it would finally reach him, or pressure from the Michel Platini-led UEFA, or ultimately his own conscience, remain questions. Mr. Blatter believed he was a part of the solution and not the problem, although hardly anyone accepted that. In politics it is said ‘perception is reality’, and in the political theatre that FIFA had become over the years it was no different. Any effort to turn FIFA around would have rung hollow with him at the helm. Accountability has to begin at the top, and Mr. Blatter’s resignation is the first step towards that.

Going forward, the need is to transform the way FIFA works. In 2011, before starting his fourth term, Mr. Blatter engaged Mark Pieth, a Professor of criminal law at Basel University, to create a road map for reform. His recommendations included fixing term limits for the president and executive committee members, proper scrutiny of candidates nominated to the executive committee and greater financial controls. None of these has been acted upon, and the time to do so is now. The deeply entrenched quid pro quo system between Mr. Blatter’s regime and regional football associations, with the development funding route turning into a tool to buy votes and thereby creating divisions within the footballing fraternity, has to end. But that shouldn’t mean a throwback to an era when Europe dominated the football scene: that was precisely the reason why Mr. Blatter was so popular in the developing world. It is imperative that a truly democratic system is put in place. And the leader should work not just for his backers but for everyone. The selection process of World Cup hosts should become more transparent. The mess that a flawed system can create is there for everyone to see in the fact of Russia and Qatar having become hosts. It is high time the lessons were learnt.

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/editorial/editorial-on-fifa-after-sepp-blatter/article7282986.ece

TFA, State govt. racing against time

Barely months ago, Chennai was nowhere in the picture as one of the prospective venues for the 2017 FIFA under-17 World Cup to be held in India. It seemed to have passed up every opportunity to make its bid count.

Yet, it has managed to come back into the reckoning. A few question marks over other venues and the good conduct of the inaugural Indian Super League (ISL) matches in 2014 meant that the city was named as one among the prospective venues. As project director Joy Bhattacharya recently told The Hindu in Kochi, “FIFA is waiting for that big push from the Tamil Nadu government to get things moving.”

Add to that the fact that the tournament authorities might be looking at expanding the list of host cities to include more than six centres has given it hope. “The under-17 World Cup is a development tournament,” said Bhattacharya on Saturday. “FIFA has picked India as the host for the 2017 edition only to promote the game in the region. Chile 2015 has seven venues, so even in India there can be more than six venues, as long as it is commercially feasible.”

But how did things reach such a stage where Chennai has to play a catch-up game? From the time the original shortlist of eight host cities was made in late 2013, the administrative limbo, first in the Tamil Nadu Football Association (TFA) and then the State government, has ensured that it has missed every deadline.

“We got the TFA’s letter of interest after the deadline had expired,” AIFF secretary Kushal Das had told The Hindu in April last year.

“But, we made an exception and asked them to submit the required documents related to the host city agreement.”

It is to be noted that the bid documents have not been sent till date. The effort to finalise the bid documents had in fact started in July 2014, when the general secretary of the TFA wrote to the State government, through the Sports Development Authority of Tamil Nadu (SDAT), seeking permission to use the SDAT Jawaharlal Nehru stadium. The list of FIFA-mandated requirements that a host city needs to fulfil was also attached.

The government, within days, sought clarifications on certain technical issues through its legal team to take the process forward. Almost a year has passed since then, but the TFA is yet to reply.

When quizzed on the delay, its president, Jesiah Villavarayar, who took over in September 2014, refused to dwell on the past and said he was hopeful that everything would turn out well in the end.

“We are meeting the Sports Minister in the first week of June, and are hopeful that things would move quickly,” he said. “We are trying our best to make it happen. We are in the process of readying the bid document. We continue to maintain a good rapport with FIFA.”

But, the task seems daunting. Four cities — Guwahati, Kolkata, Kochi and Mumbai — have already been given provisional nods after the recent round of inspections. The certification, as Bhattacharya said, “allows the selected venues to speed up the work and avail themselves of necessary central funds”.

Goa and New Delhi may have encountered a few hiccups — relating to one of the training venues in the former’s case and discussions with the stakeholders (the State and Central governments) in the latter’s — but they are expected to be resolved soon.

The ISL has no doubt given a much-needed facelift to the Nehru stadium, but more needs to be done outside it too (see box).

One among those is with respect to the practice grounds. It is learnt that in the report the FIFA inspection committee submitted last December after its visit to Chennai, the four practice grounds — MCC Tambaram, University Union ground, SDAT Nehru Park and Nehru Stadium ‘B’ ground — weren’t rated highly.

“The FIFA team will visit Chennai if and when the local organisation shows some tangible progress,” said Bhattacharya.

The onus is thus on the TFA and the State government to show that.

(Additional reporting by K. Keerthivasan & Ayon Sengupta)

What comprises the bid?

A snapshot of what the bid document consists of:

Stadium agreement: Stadium plan and the fulfilment of norms as listed by FIFA. For example, the pitch size has to be 105x68 metres and with three to five metres of grass around. Commentary box and media centre with 100 workstations having cable, internet facility, four equal size dressing rooms, match official rooms, one for dope testing with refrigeration, VIP area, 40 TV monitors with live match feeds etc.

Host city agreement: Four practice grounds, exclusive zones identified by FIFA in which the host city has to ensure that commercial and non-commercial activities shall not operate, environmental concerns, comprehensive public liability insurance to cover possible losses, bodily injuries, property damage etc, and the same is to cover FIFA and its personnel etc.

Government guarantee 1 (Security): VIP guest protocol and traffic clearances.

Government guarantee 2 (Taxation): An undertaking regarding exemptions with respect to indirect taxes without any pre-conditions.

http://www.thehindu.com/sport/football/tfa-state-govt-racing-against-time/article7265296.ece

FIFA under a cloud

The arrest of some current and former FIFA officials by the Swiss police for extradition to the U.S. over federal corruption charges, and a subsequent raid in Zurich in a parallel investigation into the allotment of the 2018 and 2022 World Cup hosting rights to Russia and Qatar respectively, have brought to the fore yet again the worst-kept secret in the sporting world — that football’s governing body is steeped in endemic corruption. Since the days of João Havelange, who was FIFA president from 1974 to 1998, and then through the tenure of the incumbent, Joseph S. Blatter, charges of financial misconduct have been routinely levelled. But they merely shook the edifice; none actually hit the top of the hierarchy. However, the current round of charges are grave. The U.S. Department of Justice has alleged a “24-year scheme to enrich themselves through the corruption of international soccer” and booked people for fraud, racketeering and money laundering conspiracies. The bribes and kickbacks centred on sports marketing deals could be worth more than $150 million. One revelation is of an alleged $10-million payment to some FIFA executive committee members to vote for South Africa to host the 2010 World Cup.

This has come two days before the FIFA Congress, where 209 countries are to vote on a fifth term for Mr. Blatter; the circumstances are thus far from ideal to hold the election. True, none of the investigations have so far named Mr. Blatter. But with the alleged misdeeds having happened under his watch, there is a need to fix accountability. Four years ago when he was re-elected unopposed after his Qatari rival, Mohammed bin Hammam, had been banned amid bribery claims, he asked: “Crisis? What is a crisis?” This time he cannot be in denial. The other consequence of this scandal concerns the choice of Russia and Qatar as World Cup hosts. The race to host them was chaotic and controversial. Of the 24 voters who were to decide the claims of the two cities in 2010, two never made it to the board room, following bribery allegations. Now almost half of them stand discredited. Also, the choice of Qatar as a host was made despite concerns over its summer weather and widespread reports of its poor treatment of migrant workers. FIFA might now say the investigation was a result of its own report submitted in November 2014, but it is a fact that the organisation’s ethics committee had closed its investigation into the bidding process, ruling that breaches, if any, were only of “very limited scope”. Football is perhaps the only truly global sport, and it is loved by millions of fans as the beautiful game. For it to remain that, the need is for democratic governance and not the current, allegedly corrupt, fiefdom that has seen just two presidents in four decades.

http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/editorial/fifa-under-a-cloud/article7256662.ece