By Samindra Kunti in Jeddah
December 22 – The Norwegian FA (NFF) has slammed FIFA’s bidding process for the 2034 World Cup, calling it a “foregone conclusion” and pointing at “a lack of transparency” in the decision making.
On the sidelines of the FIFA Summit and the Club World Cup, the first FIFA tournament in Saudi Arabia since the 1997 Confederations Cup and reflective of the direction the world governing body is travelling, NFF secretary general Karl-Petter Loken has torn apart the process that led to Saudi Arabia’s pole position to land the 2034 World Cup.
The Arab Kingdom is the sole candidate after Australia briefly mulled over a bid, but decided to not go ahead.
“This was presented as a fait accompli, a foregone conclusion, when the start of the bidding process was announced with only one bid,” said Loken.
“The decision that only FAs from AFC and OFC would be eligible to bid for 2034 and that the bidding process could commence with only one bid, was a decision taken by the Council. We are questioning the lack of transparency in the decision-making.”
FIFA restricted decision-making over the bidders and initial process for the 2030 and 2034 World Cups to the Council and the president, which will leave the Congress to rubber-stamp the host award to Saudi Arabia next year.
“This signals that the decision-making is moved from the Congress, where all member FAs vote on which bid is most suited to host the World Cup and which is FIFAs most democratic forum, to the Council, which is a smaller group and where there is less transparency,” said Loken.
“This is the opposite of what was promised with the new FIFA statutes from 2016; that principles of good governance should guide operations.”
It is not the first time that the NFF has criticised FIFA’s actions. At last year’s FIFA Congress in Doha, the NFF president Lise Klaveness raised the issue of migrant workers and discrimination of the LGBT community in Qatar, a criticism aimed directly at both FIFA and the host nation of the 2022 World Cup. As a consequence of her speech, Klaveness became alienated in FIFA circles but she spoke with the FIFA president again at the opening match of last summer’s Women’s World Cup.
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