FOOTBALL IS COMING HOME » FIFA

FIFA ready for more Champagne?

Editor — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 16:33:25 +0000

By Andreas Selliaas in Norway (translated by Pelle Kvalsund)

The day after. Sunday 15 January, 2012, I received an email from the former director of FIFA’s international operations, Jerome Champagne. Receiving the e-mail on that particular Sunday was a bit odd since I had been to a champagne party the night before and the desire for something that had to do with champagne was very minimal. Attached to Mr. Champagne’s e-mail were three documents: a 25-page memo on how Champagne wants to reform FIFA, a press release from FIFA in 2010 on Champagne’s departure from FIFA, and a newspaper article from Le Monde the week before where Champagnes outlines the main points in the lengthy memo. The same e-mail was sent to all 208 members of FIFA and people attending the Play the Game conference in Cologne in October 2011. The memo is interesting in several respects.

Champagne’s-CV. Jerome Champagne is significant in the FIFA context. He was, as mentioned, head of their international operations for many years. He has been credited for shaping the new international transfer system for footballers and praised for FIFA’s assistance to the Football Federation of Kosovo, for bringing together football leaders from the Greek and Turkish sides in Cyprus, and for his assistance and on-going commitment to Palestinian football. A former French diplomat, Champagne held a key position in the organizing committee for the 1998 World Cup in France. He also has worked as a journalist. The reason for his departure from FIFA in 2010 is unclear. It is believed that he was sacked, but the real reason for his sudden departure is still unknown.

Silence in Cologne. Jerome Champagne was one of the speakers at Play the Game conference in Cologne last year. When he was asked why he had to depart from FIFA, he would not answer. He also refused to share any written material after his lecture to foreign sports journalists, sports academics and stakeholders in sports. Champagne is still silent about his sudden departure from FIFA, but has finally been willing to share his views on FIFA reforms in written form. And some of his views are quite controversial, possibly explosive.

7-11. In his documents Champagne lists seven problem areas for FIFA:

1. Amateur football and professional football
2. Club football and national team football
3. European football and football in the rest of the world
4. Clubs and players
5. Relationship of football with money between the need of it and the dangers of its excesses
6. Autonomy of football and dialogue with its environment, specificity and ordinary justice
7. Globalization, identity and imbalances

He also has 11 proposals for changing FIFA:

1. Revive the democratic debate within the football pyramid
2. Increase even more development programs with new solidarity mechanisms
3. Restore the role and the centrality of the FAs while clarifying the relations with the confederations
4. Involve leagues, clubs and players in the decision-making process
5. Adjust FIFA to the evolutions of today’s world to reflect them better
6. Reshuffle the power responsibilities between the FIFA President, the Executive Committee and the Associations
7. Strengthen FIFA’s governance structures
8. Reform FIFA’s administration
9. Modify the insulation of refereeing debates
10. Define and implement a more comprehensive notion of autonomy
11. Reconnect FIFA with the “people of football”

208-club. In Cologne, he surprised many observers when he said that Sepp Blatter was not the problem in FIFA. This from a man who was allegedly sacked? Champagne believed that the FIFA president had too little power, but that the Executive Committee (ExCo) — consisting of 24 persons (when no one is suspended) had too much power. His proposal was a democratization of FIFA in which all 208 member nations have more of a say in the choice of World Cup hosts, for example. Increasing the power of each member nation would circumvent the power of the continental confederations such as UEFA and CONCACAF. If such a change will lead to less corruption in FIFA is uncertain. The acclaimed journalist Steve Menary — who sat on the panel “FIFA under fire” I was leading during the Play the Game conference — is of the opinion that more power to each nation, and especially the smaller nations, would open up opportunities for more corruption through the FIFA Financial Assistance Programme (FAP). Nevertheless, if more power is given to each nation, the game of power and positions change dramatically in FIFA.

English misery. Champagne also criticizes the English FA and says that they should lose their “Home Nation” privilege, which allows the United Kingdom to have four member nations (England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland) and a vice-presidency in the FIFA ExCo. Champagne believes that this is old fashioned and do not serve British interests. He further claims that England would have been a far stronger nation in FIFA without an automatic pass into the ExCo. He suggests that the power struggle between the four associations in the UK sharply curtails the British ability to influence FIFA in the way they want. Whether the removal of Home Nation privilege would have given England a better opportunity to get the World Cup in 2018 I’m not sure, but one can speculate . . .

Champagne FIFA president? There are many interesting ideas in Champagne’s memo and many of them would help FIFA be more up to date and more transparent. But the question that arises is why he has suddenly reappeared with his reformist ideas and without criticizing FIFA-president Sepp Blatter. Further, why does he send these documents to me (and other hand-picked people)? Jerome Champagne was one of the most powerful people in FIFA and he has never been accused of being corrupt. He does not attack Blatter, instead he indirectly supports him. It almost seems like he is defending Blatter as a person and as FIFA-president. The question is whether this intervention is really an attack on UEFA president Michel Platini, the man most observers believe will succeed Blatter as President of FIFA. After all, changing the power structure in FIFA and devolving more power to each association at the expense of the confederations, would probably make the election of the FIFA President in 2015 a lot less predictable than it appears today. My sense is that Champagne will be one of the candidates.

Part of the Game? So why did I get this e-mail? One reason may be that on a couple of occasions I asked Champagne to send me his Cologne presentation in writing. Another reason could be that he wants to use me to spread his proposal for reform to countries that rarely qualify for major championships (I’m from Norway). The last reason could be that he would like to use me in his battle to become the new FIFA president. You are hereby warned!

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Kick Blatter Out

Editor — Sun, 27 Nov 2011 21:03:11 +0000

A must-have t-shirt that riffs off the brilliant Kick it Out campaign, courtesy of our friends at Philosophy Football. “From vote-rigging to covering-up corruption, via advocating tight-fitting kits for women footballers, selling the game short to sponsors and now fighting racism with a handshake. It’s surely time for Blatter to go.”

Get yours here.

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FIFA Bribes on Video: The Jack Warner Files

Peter Alegi — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 00:53:32 +0000

The Daily Telegraph web site posted video evidence of Jack Warner, former CONCACAF president and FIFA vice-president, explaining Mohammad Bin Hammam’s cash-for-votes scheme at a Caribbean Football Union meeting in March 2011. “If you are pious then go and build a church,” he tells the audience.

Short version of the video here, long version here

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Blazer Leaves CONCACAF, Remains in FIFA Executive

Peter Alegi — Sun, 09 Oct 2011 13:08:08 +0000

Chuck Blazer, the American General Secretary of CONCACAF, announced he is leaving his post at the end of the year, but will remain on FIFA’s Executive Committee. Blazer, 65, has been milking football for his personal profit and pleasure under the tutelage of CONCACAF and FIFA godfather Jack Warner for two decades. In the build up to the FIFA presidential election earlier in the year, Blazer blew the whistle on a cash-for-votes scheme that led to Blatter being reelected unopposed.

In August, it was also revealed that Blazer was under FBI investigation for tax evasion. Investigative reporter Andrew Jennings — the bane of FIFA crooks’ existence — has written about Blazer’s world of offshore accounts and football-funded lavish lifestyle. “His confidential contract reveals that he hires himself out from his Cayman-based company Sportvertising,” Jennings writes. “It also reveals that he pockets 10% in ‘commissions’ from regional football marketing deals. Last year he picked up nearly $2 million and over the last five years has taken $9.6 million. The sums are recorded in Concacaf accounts – which are not made public – under the heading of ‘Commissions’ – but with no indication he received them.”

A former CONCACAF employee in New York blogged in May about going out with Blazer to strip clubs in Manhattan. The General Secretary treated himself and his staff to “food, strippers, dancers, and massages” paid with “an American Express Card, with CONCACAF and Blazer’s name on it. [. . .] That’s what the General Secretary and Treasurer of CONCACAF, the FIFA Executive from North America, spent the region’s money on . . . regularly,” wrote Mel Brennan.

For Sunil Gulati, US Soccer president, however, “Chuck’s contributions to the sport over the last 30 years are unparalleled. All of us in Concacaf owe him a great debt of gratitude for his sustained efforts in helping to take the sport to where it is today. There is no doubt that he will continue to make an impact in whatever role he chooses.” For the good of the game: the saga continues.

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2014 World Cup Draw: Fans Protest in Rio

Peter Alegi — Sat, 30 Jul 2011 18:00:01 +0000

The 2014 World Cup officially got underway today with the qualifying draw in Rio de Janeiro. Simultaneously, the Associação Nacional dos Torcedores de futebol (ANT, the National Association of Football Supporters) organized a demonstration against the World Cup (and the 2016 Olympics). ANT’s call to protest read thusly:

Do you think that the World Cup belongs to us?

Our government continually says that the World Cup and Olympics will bring benefits to Rio de Janeiro and Brazil. But who will benefit? The cost of living and rent are continually on the rise, families are forcibly removed from their homes and street vendors are prevented from working.

More: they are wasting public money on all of these projects and have put forward a law that will hide how much they have spent. To make things worse, the organizers of the World Cup, FIFA and Ricardo Teixeira (the president of the Brazilian Football Federation), are being accused of corruption by multiple sources.

Everything indicates that the World Cup and Olympics are going to repeat, on a larger scale, the history of the 2007 Pan American Games: misappropriation of public funds, unnecessarily large construction projects that become useless after the competition, benefits only for large businesses whose owners are friends of those in power and the violation of the human rights of millions of Brazilians.

The forced removal of families affected by these projects is happening in an arbitrary and violent manner. This situation has already been denounced by the United Nations. Mega-events are being used to install a State of Exception, with the systematic violation of the rule of law.

In this vein, what will be the legacy of the mega-events? The privatization of the city, of health and education? The gentrification of football culture and its stadiums? That private companies will reap profit and benefits with exemptions from taxation and subsidized loans? The profits from the World Cup will be for entrepreneurs, and the debt will be ours. Are we going to allow the mega-event histories of Athens 2004 and South Africa 2010 to repeat themselves?

Join us! Together we will change this trajectory, come and fight! Come kick a ball around with us at the Largo do Machado, the 30th of July beginning at 10am.

Zero evictions!

The city is not merchandise to be bought and sold!

No to the privatization of land and public resources, airports, education and health care!

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Stick it to The Man: Fick Fufa

Peter Alegi — Tue, 07 Jun 2011 14:49:18 +0000

Fifa has turned the World Cup into a corporate jamboree, yet it’s the fans who have to pick up the pieces writes Mark Perryman, co-founder of Philosophy Football. In 2010 at their World Cup dissident South African fans used the slogan FICK FUFA. Now Perryman’s group put it on a campaign T-shirt as a manifesto to clear up Sepp’s mess. Buy it here.

Read Perryman’s article in The Guardian here.
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BBC Radio 4 Documentary: FIFA, Football, Power and Politics

Peter Alegi — Thu, 02 Jun 2011 19:07:05 +0000

FIFA’s newest corruption scandal and Blatter’s tragicomic re-election make David Goldblatt’s BBC radio documentary a must-listen. The author of The Ball is Round asks what is FIFA? Where has it come from and who is it for? Goldblatt hears from those who have documented FIFA’s story and its secrets and from those who have helped to shape its modern identity.

Click here to listen.
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Artificial Clouds for Qatar 2022

Peter Alegi — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 12:52:41 +0000

Saud Abdul Ghani, head of the Mechanical Engineering department at the University of Qatar, recently unveiled a special plan for the 2022 World Cup: remote-controlled artificial clouds over the stadiums!

Powered by four solar engines, the man-made clouds would be made of ultra light carbon fiber in an attempt to bring some relief to fans in the stands and players on the field from temperatures expected to reach 122 degrees Fahrenheit (50 Celsius) during the Qatari summer. The cost of this Addams family trick? $500,000.
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South Africa “forgets” to vote for FIFA awards

Peter Alegi — Wed, 12 Jan 2011 02:39:53 +0000

Mzansi Football and Kickoff.com report that the captains and coaches of South Africa’s men’s and women’s national teams failed to cast their vote for FIFA’s Golden Ball as the World’s Player of the Year awards are now known. According to the governing body, the 2010 World Cup hosts were one of just a handful of countries (out of 208) that did not vote. The awards went to Lionel Messi for the second year in a row and Marta for the fifth (?!) year in a row.

“It is the latest botch up by SAFA since the World Cup and makes a mockery of claims the association’s new leadership would bring a new efficiency to the running of the game,” writes kickoff.com. “They failed to enter the country’s teams in the All-Africa Games qualifiers and had to scramble to the Confederation of African Football in Cairo to get a backdoor entry when Namibia withdrew.” Read the full, thoroughly embarrassing details here.
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Rosa insists South Africa won the World Cup

Peter Alegi — Mon, 03 Jan 2011 19:58:14 +0000

Happy New Year to all!

Back after a month-long break, we are pleased to report that our very own Sean Jacobs made it into the opinion pages of The New York Times yesterday (Sunday, 2 January 2011) as part of the ‘Around the World in 12 Months’ feature. (Some of you may recognize some of the ideas from Sean’s ‘Africa is a Country’ blog). My favorite part is his daughter’s memory of the 2010 World Cup. Click here to read Sean’s entry about the 2010 World Cup in South Africa.
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