By Andrew Warshaw
December 6 – FIFA president Sepp Blatter has appealed to Qatar’s critics to “calm down” over questioning its suitability to stage the 2022 World Cup but insists his organisation will not shirk from its responsibilities to monitor the issue of workers’ rights in the Gulf state which has caused such widespread alarm.
Although the focus is on Brazil 2014 and today’s World Cup draw, Qatar was on the agenda for FIFA’s two-day executive committee meeting following Blatter’s visit there last month for a meeting with the Emir and subsequent assurances given to trade unions and human rights organisations.
Blatter says the contentious issue of Qatar’s so-called kafala employment system cannot be solved simply by an outcry of international condemnation. “We have to calm down,” he told reporters. “We will identify all the responsibilities . . . and will, by the end of this year or beginning of next year, have further meetings and consultations.
“I have received documents about what the Qatar authorities are doing now and will do in future . . . we have also received a lot of letters from different organisations including some of FIFA’s member associations. Now we shall go to the attribution of responsibilities of the different parties.
“We will speak with all these organisations then come together and draw up an inventory of where we shall go.”
Blatter made it clear that the state of Qatar and the foreign construction companies operating there had their own responsibilities to help ease the plight of migrant workers. “I’m sure that, at the end, football will be the winner because we can show the world it is possible to create good working conditions. I have been mandated by the FIFA executive to go there again and find these solutions.”
FIFA has also confirmed that a proper timescale is now in place in terms of getting the views of all stakeholders – clubs, leagues, players, broadcasters etc – about exactly which part of the year to stage the 2022 World Cup.
The established position has been that no decision on a revised schedule for any summer-to-winter switch would be taken until next year at the earliest. December 2014 now seems to be the agreed date for a final decision.
FIFA recently appointed the Asian Football Confederation president, Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa of Bahrain, to oversee the worldwide consultation process along with FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke in order to come up with a compromise solution.
The choices are November/December (Blatter’s personal preference), April/May and January-February – though the last of these is unlikely because of a clash with the winter Olympics. It is even possible, though again unlikely, that FIFA may stick with the original schedule to hold the tournament in the heat of the Gulf summer.
FIFA have now drawn up a road map for the process as follows: Consultations among the international football community and FIFA’s business partners up until August 2014;Further discussions at international match calendar meetings in September 2014 and November 2014; presentation to the executive committee in December 2014.
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