English FA chairman will not support 2015 election bid by Blatter

By David Gold in Westminster in London

July 17 – English Football Association (FA) chairman David Bernstein will not support a bid by Sepp Blatter to stand for election again in 2015, he said here today.

Just prior to last year’s FIFA Presidential election the cash-for-votes scandal broke, following which Bernstein (pictured top) tried to delay the vote.

He had little support for the move, however, as Blatter won the subsequent election to extend his term in office.

Victory was marred by the scandal and the allegations that his only rival, Qatar’s Mohamed Bin Hammam, had tried to bribe Caribbean delegates with the help of Jack Warner.

Both have since departed, and Blatter then said he would leave office when his term expires in 2015.

Blatter (pictured below) admitted recently that he could yet try to stay on, saying: “I would not exclude the possibility…let’s see how my health is.”

Bernstein was pressed on matters relating to FIFA by Damien Collins MP during a select committee hearing into English football governance.

The hearing was investigating a range of issues, such as the structure of the FA board, English football finance and the football creditors rule among others.

Collins broke from the agenda to press Bernstein on international affairs after last week’s long awaited publication of the ISL files.

They revealed that former FIFA President João Havelange and his former son-in-law, Ricardo Teixeira, until recently the head of the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) and Brazil 2014, had received huge sums of money from FIFA’s former marketing partner.

Teixeira received at least $13 million (£8.4 million/€10.6 million) between 1992 and 1997 from ISL and Havelange around $1 million (£645,000/€818,000) according to the files, released last week.

FIFA, having blocked their publication for so long, finally supported the release of those files as part of the reform process conducted in the wake of the cash-for-votes scandal.

Although he added that Britain is just “one nation out of 200”, Bernstein was firm on the hypothetical scenario of Blatter seeking to extent his time in office beyond 2015, saying: “I would not support that.”

However, when pressed to give a view on whether Blatter should now resign, following a similar call from German Football League President Reinhard Rauball, Bernstein defended the FIFA President.

“I’m not going to say that today,” he replied.

“I stood up strongly last year in terms of the election itself and I think that probably helped for a real feel of change and reform.

“I am genuinely encouraged in the last year as to what I have seen.

“Having spoken to some of the more progressive countries…there is a real feel that there is a real desire and understanding for change to take place.

“Clearly these accusations are absolutely awful and let’s see where it goes.

“I am not going to make calls for resignations sitting here today.”

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