The Leman Gooner
The ongoing FIFA saga has provoked all sorts of reactions, from ‘same old same old’ to ‘unbelievable’. It is my view that an extraordinary event like the one we are experiencing at this moment should not be viewed as a crisis but as an opportunity, a golden opportunity to bring the corporate governance of football into normalcy.
Something Happened on the Way to Heaven, or Not?
Sepp Blatter was about to celebrate his renewed mandate when police stormed into a Zurich hotel and indicted a number of high profile FIFA executive committee members. The first reaction was ‘we can fix it’, followed by ‘we should not judge the ethics of the FIFA football family by isolated incidents’. As much as I disagree with both statements, I think it makes sense to ask whether we are dealing with isolated incidents or with something endemic, if not pandemic.
The policy prescription, the ‘medicine’ in other words, will be different depending on whether we are in the former or the latter scenario. If we are dealing with isolated incidents, then the proper measure would be to punish those few refusing to play by the rules. If we are dealing with a generalized attitude of corruption, then we need to rethink the FIFA institutions.
I am afraid we are dealing with the latter. Several reasons would argue in favour of what I suggest here.
First, the number of culprits. A few members have already been indicted, others are in the process of following them.
Second, the issues involved. Some are accused for accepting bribes to vote in favour of a particular country to host important competitions. Others are accused for accepting illegal payments irrespective of voting.
Third, and probably worse, the contempt that FIFA Executive Committee members show for the procedures they themselves have put into place. Michel Platini, and indeed the UEFA through its de facto Head, complained that the FIFA Ethics Committee followed a rather inappropriate route to sanction Platini. Irrespective of the inconsistency here (why were not these voices heard when say Bin Hamam was being prosecuted?), it is at least worrisome that the framers of the FIFA corporate governance have issues with their brainchild.
This is a classic case of ‘heads you lose, tails you lose’. If Platini is right, then a number of people were condemned following the wrong procedure. If Platini is wrong, then he is simply guilty.
Various individuals involved in illegalities, coupled with different illegalities committed, argue for deep-rooted problems, and not for isolated incidents. We are not facing a quick fix problem. It is not that all was going well, and suddenly there was a deviation. It is rather all was going wrong. FIFA was an accident waiting to happen. Well, it happened.
Inquiring into the Causes
Did we have to wait for the intervention of US justice system to do the obvious? As a matter of fact, yes we did. And yet the writings were on the wall for some time now. I am not claiming to be exhaustive in what follows, but would like to highlight some issues that in my view, are serious candidates for the Guinness Book of Records under the heading ‘Mechanisms Inducing Corruption’.
Awarding World Cups
The FIFA Executive Committee votes having listened to presentations by candidate countries. The identity of the FIFA Executive Committee is known ex ante. The stakes are also known. Football is the world’s most popular sport, and TV stations are prepared to go the extra buck in order to secure the right to transmit games. And final decisions do not have to be justified.
Take Qatar as an illustration. Qatar wins the right to host games in the summer of 2022. A few months later, FIFA recognizes that it is impossible for Qatar to do that in the summer. Has climate change become so dramatic overnight? Was it not known that it is impossible for humans to play a series of games within a short time under the normal summer conditions in that part of the world? Did not anyone, anyone at FIFA feel that the awarding of the contract should be investigated? Or did they take the view that by punishing Bin Hamam their job was done?
The proximate cause for this mess might be corruption. The ultimate cause though, is the voting procedures. It just cannot be that a few guys vote in the dark room, and that is that. Someone should be held accountable, and this someone should at the very least be the guys that voted the way they did. This must change.
There is lot of relevant practice in the realm of bidding for contracts both in the field of government (government procurement) as well as in the private sector. One of the first things that must change is the awarding process. Law makers should be inspired by government procurement practices in the WTO for example, and proceed accordingly.
Awarding TV Rights
We have no idea how TV rights for the important competition like the World Cup are awarded. Rumour has it, a relative of the disgraced FIFA President is in control, and this fact in and of itself should raise eyebrows. And yet none have been risen, not so for a number of years by now.
The numbers involved are hallucinating. FIFA put into place the most opaque, nontransparent process to award TV rights, and further made sure that no one would be held accountable for following this procedure. Just pause for a moment and think if your government, or any public entity was behaving this way. What if for example, the UK Minister of Sport had assigned to his/her nephew the right to negotiate similar deals?
Even the thought is breathtaking. Alas, there is a lot of practice too.
Law-Making at FIFA
There is a plethora of statutes that are being adopted by various committees and voted into law by the Executive Committee.
Who are the people participating in these committees, and how have they been elected? Whose initiative is law making, and how do we respect public order? Blatter was going around famously threatening football associations that they would be expelled if they did not comply with FIFA’s rules? What? Since when has FIFA law trumped public order? Who is Blatter to behave in similar contempt of domestic legal traditions?
On the other hand, does the Executive Committee understand what is at stake every time it is called to adopt a proposition? Or is it simply rubberstamping whatever is brought before it? Is there any control of legality of the FIFA legislative output? Alas, we do not know. Worse, no one in the FIFA hierarchy felt that these questions should be asked.
