The FIFA trials – somewhat misnamed as they were very much more to do with CONCACAF and CONMEBOL and greedy individuals – are not over. A lot of people are still trembling in their shoes and watching carefully – but what for?
Word is that, while people may change (as they certainly did in the DOJ investigations), the system doesn’t. And since the system doesn’t, the US will continue to exercise its God-given right of supremacy-rule over others. It is looking increasingly like USA vs. the Rest of the Shithole World, especially in the football world.
The US generally in foreign policy circles has assumed the visage of an out of control predator on the Stormy rampage, hunting wherever its desire takes it.
Next stop: Morocco.
The US (and their two obedient stooges) looked a certain shoo-in for the 2026 World Cup. Even when cheeky upstart Morocco, clearly out of step with the new world order in FIFA, announced their bid, no-one took them seriously.
That they have become a very serious contender is in great part due to the US arrogance and complacency at failing to understand global opinion – and even worse – global football people. It might seem to the US that it is all about the money – but it actually isn’t necessarily always like that. Something that their biggest supporter, all-about-the-money FIFA president Gianni Infantino should have been able to advise them.
So lowly Morocco in daring to counter them, has sparked the kind of moral and philosophical football issues that football people seldom like to face. Morocco’s temerity to take on the unholy trinity was well…
Not a good idea.
But an even worse idea was for South Africa to kind of timidly put its hand up and attempt to vote for Morocco too. This is the same South Africa whose collective Mandela-led leadership were (some still are) on America’s terrorism watch list (the entire ANC was, as was Mandela and, you guessed it, Tokyo Sexwale… the erstwhile Presidential contender who turned Infantino sycophant when it really mattered).
At first, SAFA president Danny Jordaan’s words favoured Morocco, until the country’s sports minister intervened to announce that his country would be voting for the US joint bid. After the Minister’s declaration of SA intent, Jordaan went very silent.
So what will South Africa do?
Go with Ahmad Ahmad (a Trojan horse too? After all, he was only elected because of Infantino’s active support) and Africa, or go it the way of least resistance?
My guess is the latter.
Jeff Webb is not yet sentenced (will he ever be?), Jack Warner remains firmly in his Trini home, while others have quietly disappeared from sight. And there remains the lingering question over the $10 million that was paid by, well, by whom to who, as it floated between SA, FIFA and the Caribbean looking for a diaspora.
The £10 million that Jack received and Uncle Sam wants – money that FIFA sent to Jack by request of SA president Mbeki – will be the reason why South Africa will suddenly no longer support Africa but itself.
Tokyo Sexwale was, after all, questioned by a Grand Jury (he WAS a member of the Organising Committee of the South African World Cup), while Danny Jordaan has had his feet in very colourful waters. South Africa will want to protect her children (no matter how naughty they were, allegedly), hence South Africa must follow Uncle Sam’s orders and vote for the supremacy of white power.
Given that Infantino, (also a creation of the USA) will be carefully watching as to who votes for which Bid in Moscow, and given the wrath that will descend on every single FIFA person of direct or indirect relevance if the US were to lose again, the USA will be counting, filming, watching and grinding (teeth), and taking notes.
If South Africa votes for Morocco, expect indictments and arrest warrants with names of South Africans written on them. And Africans, and others who did not vote for them.
And if Morocco wins, it will likely be the end of FIFA as we know it.
Now, that may actually not be a bad thing, given that football’s world body is rapidly degenerating into nothing but a post-capitalist money-hoarding machine (to be), but if the USA should lose (they won’t), it is the end of International Association Football and the end of the lamentable remnants of what used to be a powerful world body that did not only harm but lots of good to lots of small countries as well (latterly also known as shithole countries).
Therefore, and while I deplore the valiant and politically astute fight by little Morocco – one of the most beautiful countries in North Africa – it is a cause they must inevitably lose but in doing so will have shone a painfully uncomfortable light into the manipulation and political corruption that is still deep in the heart of this brave, new and supposedly clean and shiny FIFA 2.0.
The only thing that irks me and no doubt a handful of others, is to experience yet another weird mirage on Fox and Friends the morning after the victory, to hear Trump declare yet another success of his own making. “I made sure we’d win this Bid”. Not that he knows what Bid he’s talking about but that’s irrelevant. They will have won. And that’s what matters.
James Dostoyevsky is a Washington-based observer of politics and sports. He can be contacted at moc.l1713873081labto1713873081ofdlr1713873081owedi1713873081sni@o1713873081fni1713873081