FIFA Ethics’ integrity under fire as elections could make Rojas the judge of her own cases

FIFA shadows

By Paul Nicholson

May 18 – FIFA Ethics’ chair of its investigatory chamber, Colombian Claudia Rojas, could switch to the chair of its adjudicatory chamber following voting by member associations that closes today. If elected as head of the judiciary, it would mean she would have the final judgement on ongoing cases she has opened and/or investigated.

The stunning possibility is revealed in FIFA voting papers that show Rojas as standing for both her old position in the investigatory chamber, as well as for a position in the adjudicatory chamber.

In both elections, Rojas is one of five candidates standing for three positions (Chairperson and two deputy chairpersons). For the adjudicatory chamber positions she is standing against current incumbents Vassilios Skouris (Greece) and Fiti Sunia (American Samoa) – see the list of candidates below.

Confidence has long been lost in the independence of FIFA’s Ethics function. Indeed, that pretty much disappeared overnight when president Gianni Infantino railroaded through rules that allowed the FIFA executive to nominate its Ethics personnel, saying that it would only be for a year. Of course it wasn’t just for a year, and FIFA effectively picked its own ‘independent’ Ethics functionaries for four-year terms in 2017, rubber-stamped by its generally sleep-walking members at its Congress.

FIFA’s executive has long been criticised as using its Ethics process as a blunt tool to control its membership. Examples of member association presidents being threatened with Ethics investigations and judgements that could be made to disappear if they followed the FIFA executive line have multiplied – particularly in Africa where FIFA has taken a vice-like grip over the confederation’s business.

It has led to a situation that gives the impression that the FIFA executive can and will do whatever it wants with its Ethics function to drive its own political and financial agenda. And it seems it now doesn’t care if it is seen doing so.

One suspects this wasn’t the intention of the US Department of Justice’s incursion into FIFA, its politics and its finances with the May 2015 indictments. But it has become one of the outcomes. FIFA fought hard to have its status designated as a victim following those indictments, rather than being the body that orchestrated the criminal conspiracy.

Whether Rojas keeps her job, finds a new one in the judiciary chamber, or ends up with nothing at all, remains to be seen. One suspects that they will manage to find her a slot somewhere, after all she has served the executive well, including ruling that there were no grounds to suspend or investigate Infantino in light of his own criminal investigation into interfering with Swiss judicial procedures regarding his secret meetings with former Swiss Attorney General Michael Lauber.

At FIFA’s 71stCongress on Friday, member nations will be asked to approve en bloc the new chairs and deputy chairs of its key ethics functions, as well as committee members. Before then they will have conveniently voted electronically. No forum for discussion or debate. It is the kind of election FIFA and many of its confederations champion these days as democracy in action.

Congress will also approve – most likely on the nod – the merger of its Audit and Compliance Committee, and its Governance Committee (its one-time embarrassingly vociferous problem child). There are doubtless good and logical reasons (as well as financial reasons) to merge the two committees. But is less formal governance what FIFA really needs right now?

Election candidates

Ethics Committee – investigatory chamber (chairperson and two deputy chairpersons):

Bruno De Vita (Canada)*

Martin Ngoga (Rwanda)*

Alejandro Piera (Paraguay)

Parasuraman Subramanian (Malaysia)

Ethics Committee – adjudicatory chamber (chairperson and two deputy chairpersons):

Jean-Michel Marmayou (France)

Alejandro Piera (Paraguay)

Maria Claudia Rojas (Colombia)

Vassilios Skouris (Greece)*

Fiti Sunia (American Samoa)*

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