By Andrew Warshaw
December 17 – The two whistleblowers interviewed during Michael Garcia’s World Cup corruption probe have had their complaints that they were unfairly identified rejected by FIFA.
Phaedra Al-majid, who worked for a time on the Qatar bid, and former Australia bid communications director Bonita Mersiades were furious their evidence was dismissed and protested that ethics judge Hans-Joachim Eckert, in his summary of what took place during the bid process, had breached an undertaking of confidentialty.
Neither were actually named by Eckert but claim they had their covers blown in his precis of American investigator Michael Garcia’s full investigation report into the 2018-2022 World Cup bid scandal. Both went public with statements and interviews after the Eckert summary.
The pair subsequently filed an ethics complaint against Eckert but this has now been turned down by FIFA’s disciplinary committee even though Eckert and Garcia, joint heads of FIFA’s ethics committee, were technically working independently, one argument therefore being they are not subject to any jurisdiction by another body.
Al-Majid and Mersiades claim they were promised confidentiality by Garcia, as all witnesses were. But disciplinary committee chairman Claudio Sulser ruled there were “no grounds” for opening proceedings.
In what is becoming an ever-complex legal minefield, a FIFA spokesman said no names had been actually mentioned, stressing the whistleblowers’ breach of confidentiality claim had “no substance” because they had “gone public” with their own media activities before Eckert’s summary came out.
“No names were mentioned in the statement and any information provided was of a general nature. Thus, there was no divulgence of any information of a confidential nature.
“The chairman reviewed all provided material and stressed that, since the participants in the investigation had gone public with their own media activities long before the publication of the statement of the chairman of the adjudicatory chamber Judge Eckert, the breach of confidentiality claim had no substance.”
FIFA also disclosed that Garcia had revealed in a letter to Sulser that the complaints by the two whistleblowers were “without merit and that, as far as he was concerned, there had been no infringements by Eckert”.
A key element of the issue hinges on the fact that both Al-majid and Mersiades revealed themselves following the Eckert summary. Neither accept that the Eckert summary gave them the confidentiality promised. It seems, looking at a wider pictures, that all sides say they want confidentiality, but only on their terms.
In a statement of her own, Al-majid, who has been co-operating with a separate FBI probe in her native United States, denounced FIFA’s dismissal of her complaint as dodging the issue and a “transparent avoidance of a clear violation” of the ethics committee’s own rules.
She said: “I cooperated with Mr. Garcia’s investigation for over two and a half years under a clear, unqualified promise of confidentiality. He asked me for my confidentiality and repeatedly promised me mine. I kept my promise.
“Herr Eckert breached that confidentiality. I did not. The Disciplinary Committee’s avoidance of this undisputable violation is emblematic of its culture of self-protection.”
“The Disciplinary Committee’s assertion that I had “gone public with [my] own media activities long before the publication” of Herr Eckert’s statement is an obvious dodge. My public statements were all made long before I entered into a confidentiality agreement with Mr. Garcia. I made no public statements during the entire period of Mr. Garcia’s investigation.”
“I relied on FIFA’s promise of confidentiality and continued to honor my promise until Herr Eckert published his “Summary.” My recent public statements have only been made AFTER Herr Eckert’s identification of me in blatant violation of FIFA confidentiality rules”.
“The Disciplinary Committee’s decision today is one more example of an organization whose rules are mere formalities meaning nothing. Woe be to any other person who cares enough to risk personal safety to report FIFA corruption.”
In a statement of her own, Mersiades blasted FIFA for having “surpassed itself in obfuscation and deflection. These issues are no longer just about winning bids from Russia and Qatar and losing bids, including Australia. It is about FIFA and the bid process that lent itself to abuse. In FIFA’s world, there is no room for ordinary fans.”
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