By Andrew Warshaw
May 1 – FIFA president Gianni Infantino is reported to be under fresh scrutiny over potential ethics breaches – at a particularly sensitive time.
The highly respected German news magazine Der Spiegel claimed at the weekend that Infantino is once again under review, this time for influencing the outcome of last month’s African presidential election that saw the shock overthrow of long-time powerbroker Issa Hayatou after three decades in charge.
The claims come less than two weeks before the FIFA Congress in Bahrain at which, according to unconfirmed rumours, FIFA’s chief ethics judge Hans-Joachim Eckert and lead investigator Cornel Borbely may find themselves replaced with the blessing of Infantino.
Insideworldfootball has been told categorically that no formal procedure has been opened against Infantino. However, FIFA never comments one way or the other on preliminary proceedings.
But there is no doubt he visited widely in Africa as pictured above pre-CAF elections on a trip to Africa that included a visit to Accra, Ghana, with President of the Republic of Ghana HE Nana Akufo Addo. Infantino is at the back of the group while controversial Liberia FA President Musa Bility, presumably travelling with Infantino rather than on a co-incidental visit, is in the front row right.
Eight months ago, ethics officials cleared Infantino over claims that he had abused his position including using private jets, the way he hired and fired staff and his refusal to sign an employment contract. The complaints were ultimately thrown out and deemed internal compliance issues rather than ethical matters.
But Der Spiegel, which broke the sensational story that Germany’s 2006 World Cup organisers used a secret slush fund to buy votes and which led to an official criminal inquiry, now claims Infantino is back on the radar of FIFA’s ethics apparatus.
Under FIFA rules, the president must be politically neutral but Der Spiegel claims Infantino violated this by backing Hayatou’s little-known successor, Madagascar’s Ahmad Ahmad, when he attended a party hosted by Ahmad’s flamboyant and ambitious campaign manager Phillip Chiyangwa.
Infantino, who reportedly described Zimbabwe’s Chiyangwa – understood to be a close aide of despot leader Robert Mugabe – as “my friend and brother”, has denied any complicity whatsoever in the African ballot.
But there are those who fervently believe he was seeking revenge at being snubbed in last year’s FIFA presidential election campaign by Hayatou who openly endorsed losing candidate Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al Khalifa. “It is annoying that a FIFA president influenced this election for his own interest,” declared Opes Manuel Nascimento, head of the Guinea-Bissau soccer federation, when Ahmad dethroned Hayatou.
Whether or not he is facing renewed scrutiny, Infantino heads to Bahrain with FIFA again under a cloud of suspicion. When he took over from Sepp Blatter, he declared that the organisation’s scandal-tainted past was over but last week’s indictment of Asian football bigwig Richard Lai by the US justice department – followed by the resignation from all footballing roles of Kuwaiti strongman Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Ahmed Al-Sabah – was the clearest indication yet that the file has not been closed.
Heaping even more embarrassment on FIFA is the fact that Lai was a prominent member of its audit and compliance committee, whose very task it is to weed out financial wrongdoing and whose chairman is Tomas Vesel, one of Infantino’s strongest allies.
No wonder Infantino was quick to comment on Sheikh Ahmad’s decision to step down which removes – in theory at least – FIFA’s May 11 Congress being sidetracked.
“I have taken note of the decision of Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al Sabah. I want to thank him for taking this decision which certainly was not easy to take but is in the best interest for FIFA,” Infantino said in a statement.
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