http://www.foxsports.com.au/football/fifa-ethics-report-slams-australias-dubious-2022-world-cup-bid-tactics/story-e6frf423-1227122410226?nk=b0346015cb4b32ac951774d5cbe1282d
"According to the Report, there have been communications between one particular consultant of the Australia 2022 bid team that show that the relevant consultant executed his strategy of using his purported relationship with high-ranking FIFA officials to create the appearance that he was influencing the bidding process.”
The ethics committee also said the FFA made “certain payments” to the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF).
- Fox Sports, 14th Nov 2014
If love and marriage go together like a horse and carriage, then FIFA and corruption go together like Admire Rakti and the Shinkansen - very fast and dead on the money (in several senses of each of those words).
The initial rules for a nation to even be eligible to host the World Cup, required that the host nation have at least ten stadia, capable of holding 40,000 people. At the time of the bidding process, Japan, South Korea, Australia and the United States all had at least seven with plans to make minor upgrades to others. Qatar had nil.
On top of this, Qatar had to assure FIFA that it would install massive air-conditioners to decrease the temperatures inside the stadiums (which still do not exist) by at least 20°C and after it won the bid it requested to have the number of venues cut to eight because of rising construction costs.
With this in mind, several nations applied to FIFA to have its ethics committee look into both the bidding process of 2018 which awarded that tournament to Russia and the 2022 bidding process. Surprise surprise, it found that payments had been by a former Chairman of the Qatar Football Association and president of the Asian Football Confederation to the president of the Oceania Football Confederation to change his vote on where the 2022 World Cup would be held.
Even though Mohamed Bin Hammam was banned for life from all FIFA and football related activities, this latest report still clears the Qatar bid as being free from corruption.
The report also touched on suspended OFC representative Reynard Temarii and the attempts by Mohamed Bin Hammam to pay his legal fees and potentially deprive Australia of a vote.
Temarii could only be replaced by OFC as a FIFA executive member to vote on the World Cup bids if he accepted his ban from the FIFA Ethics Committee. If he appealed then the OFC’s vote would have been null and void.
...
"According to the Report, Mr. Temarii’s conduct and correspondence with Mr. Bin Hammam shortly after he received the one-year suspension suggest that Mr. Temarii was aware that his appeal would benefit Qatar’s bid.
However, according to the Report, there is no direct link between Qatar 2022 and any payments of Mr. Bin Hammam to Mr. Temarii."
- Fox Sports, 14th Nov 2014
This makes you scratch your head in total bewilderment. How is it that the "certain payments” made by the FFA to CONCACAF, if they were made, are seen as corruption but the fact that the ex-chairman of the very football association who is hosting the World Cup and was banned for life from all FIFA and football related activities, is not? I don't understand.
http://www.arabianbusiness.com/dubai-s-emirates-quit-as-fifa-sponsor-after-2014-570259.html#.VGbJifmUdBg
Dubai's Emirates Airline confirmed on Monday it will not renew its sponsorship contract with football governing body FIFA after the current deal expires at the end of the year.
”Emirates can confirm that a decision has been made not to renew the sponsorship agreement with FIFA past 2014. This decision was made following an evaluation of FIFA’s contract proposal which did not meet Emirates’ expectations,” the airline said in a statement to Arabian Business.
...
While Emirates did not specify the exact reason for ending its sponsorship deal with the football authority, this summer FIFA sponsors Coca-Cola, Adidas, Sony and Visa issued a statement expressing their concerns regarding allegations of bribery surrounding the hosting of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups in Russia and Qatar, respectively.
- Arabian Business.Com, 3rd Nov 2014
Not to put too fine a point on it, if Emirates Airlines which operates out of Dubai has withdrawn its support for FIFA and sponsors Coca-Cola, Adidas, Sony and Visa all have expressed concerns regarding bribery, what does that say about FIFA condemning the FFA whilst holding up someone else?
What of the allegations of virtual slavery in Qatar, in the construction of the World Cup venues?
http://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2014/nov/07/north-koreans-working-state-sponsored-slaves-qatar
Thousands of migrant labourers from North Korea are toiling for years on construction sites in Qatar for virtually no pay – including on the vast new metropolis that is the centrepiece of the World Cup – in what may amount to “state-sponsored slavery”.
According to testimonies from workers and defectors, labourers from the reclusive state said they receive almost no salaries in person while in the Gulf emirate during the three years they typically spend there.
- The Guardian, 7th Nov 2014
If you add slavery, to bribery to corruption, how do you trust any ruling by an "ethics committee"? Does FIFA even know what ethics are?
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