UEFA has issued a sharp rebuke of FIFA president Gianni Infantino after he withdrew a plan to sell a stake in FIFA’s commercial rights, including those to the World Cup, to private investors.
In a formal statement, UEFA welcomed the decision to scrap the proposal but said the episode could not simply be set aside. The body said the plan had been rejected unanimously by UEFA’s national federations as well as by many other federations and confederations around the world.
UEFA thanked fans, leagues, clubs, players, federations and confederations that had opposed the scheme, along with prime ministers, heads of state and commentators who had shown FIFA’s president that football was not for sale.
The statement said UEFA could not continue with secret plans and express processes drawn up by anonymous individuals with doubtful benefit to the sport. It called for those responsible to be identified and held to account.
Broken promises
UEFA recalled that when Infantino sought the votes of FIFA member associations to become president in 2016, he had pledged transparency, said member associations should be involved in FIFA’s daily life, and told delegates that FIFA’s money belonged to them and should serve the development of football and nothing else.
UEFA said he had failed on both commitments. The arrangement he devised and tried to force through was described as shabby, back-room and opaque rather than transparent. With FIFA’s reserves standing at more than five billion dollars, UEFA said he had also failed to put federation money to work for the good of the game.
UEFA said FIFA’s current leadership had lost not only its confidence but that of many others in the football family, and described restoring trust as work that had only just begun.
The body said it would immediately begin working with partners worldwide to propose a new way of distributing resources through the existing FIFA Forward programme.
