By Paul Nicholson in Geneva
September 3 – Mohammed Hanzab, president of the ICSS, and Emanuel Macedo de Medeiros, CEO of ICSS Europe & Latin America, issued a powerful call to action at the opening of the FITS Forum in Geneva, saying that now is not the time to be standing on the sidelines and that a global alliance is required to fight corruption and create a blueprint for sports’ commercial and political governance.
The FITS Forum (Financial Integrity and Transparency in Sport) has gathered world leaders from sport as well as institutions like the World Bank, the OECD, the Financial Action Task Force, as well US law enforcement bodies to discuss the threats facing the financial integrity of sport.
Hanzab opened proceedings saying that “we need to give sport back to people and forge a new generation of custodians of sport”.
He questioned whether in an age where the actions and emotions of top athletes are scrutinised in detail “is it really fair that only the athlete is checked…there needs to be transparency top to bottom.”
“We cannot ignore the mounting threats and allow sport to continue its rapid growth unchecked. All industries need to work together to safeguard sport and ensure good governance and effective financial control is not just an aspiration but is a reality,” he said.
Medeiros continue on the same theme highlighting the ability of sport to “amass astonishing poitical power and marketing power by every measure…” but that “the “brightest light attracts the darkest shadows”.
Medeiros introduced the FITS Project, an initiative aimed at providing “a fact-based, rigorous and neutral diagnosis on the current realities and threats facing financial integrity and transparency in sport”. The objective is also to come up with a set of the most appropriate solutions.
“We need to create a pathway to a new era of sports governance and financial integrity,” said Medeiros. “This is the moment we need to look in the mirror and decide what need to be done…we have to choose sides…sleepwalking is not an option.”
He made that the point that reforms were long overdue but that they must go far beyond FIFA. “FIFA should not cause an obliteration of other problems that are happening. The reality is that sport is too big, too popular, too rich for any jurisdiction to be immune. We have allowed a permissive environment that has left sport unprotected.”
Medeiros called for a robust global approach and the creation of a “blueprint for global action”.
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