By Andrew Warshaw
November 12 – As FIFA prepares to reveal partial conclusions of the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bid investigation, a Spanish newspaper claims Qatar will not be unduly compromised and that the finger is more likely to be pointed in the direction of Russia and England.
FIFA’s ethics committee judge Hans-Joachim Eckert is understood to be on the verge of giving the green light for publication of a summary of his findings after wading through the 430-report submitted by chief investigator Michael Garcia who took two years to examine the process behind the award of the 2018 tournament to Russia and the 2022 event to Qatar.
According to the Spanish sports newspaper AS, England, which gained only two votes bidding against Russia, appears “several times” over the course of the Garcia’s report and is cited for, among other things, providing gifts to members of FIFA’s Executive Committee during a visit to London and for a “suspicious meeting” in Johannesburg during the celebration of the 2010 World Cup.
AS says “reservations” are also expressed about Russia’s 2018 campaign. The publication did not reveal its sources but said doubts about Qatar are mainly restricted to the position of Mohamed bin Hammam, the banned former Asian Football Confederation chief snared in the infamous 2011 cash-for-votes scandal. Although he is a Qatari national, World Cup bid officials have steadfastly insisted he played no prominent role in the Gulf state’s campaign.
One point of intrigue will be whether Eckert makes reference to any information that is in the hands of the FBI in the wake of the stunning revelations that Chuck Blazer, who strode the corridors of power at FIFA for more than a generation, turned FBI informant to spy on several of his high-powered colleagues as part of an FBI investigation reportedly into money laundering and fraud in football. The information supplied by Blazer is said to implicate a number of senior football officials.
Although the world’s media has been gripped by what Eckert might reveal in his overview of the probe, he has made it clear that whatever is published will only include “a summary of the main findings, conclusions and recommendations of the report, as well as a brief evaluation of the same.”
The full report from Garcia, a former U.S. attorney, will not be published for legal reasons.
Despite pressure from many within the higher echelons of the game for FIFA to reveal the entire file for reasons of transparency, dozens of witnesses were promised confidentiality which cannot be broken under FIFA’s ethics rules.
It is unlikely therefore that Eckert will name names or that any disciplinary measures will be announced. If sanctions are applied, that is unlikely to happen until the spring.
Aside from Russia and Qatar, the bidding nations comprised England, Holland-Belgium and Spain-Portugal for 2018, and the United States, Australia, Japan and Korea for 2022.
Both Russia and Qatar have come under intense scrutiny, the former because of persistent outbreaks of racism at matches plus the military incursion into eastern Ukraine, the latter over as yet unproven bid corruption allegations and human rights violations.
In the meantime, FIFA is still getting to grips with exactly when to stage the 2022 tournament. While momentum to switch to winter is growing, international broadcasters remain a key issue. North American broadcasters Fox Sports and Telemundo are understood to have agreed to pay a record $1 billion for the rights to 2018 and 2022, based on a traditional summer World Cup.
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