KUALA LUMPUR: Fifa has been accused of breaking trust “through deception” in an open letter issued by Uefa, Concacaf and the Asian Football Confederation, the latest criticism stemming from Fifa president Gianni Infantino’s Fifa Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal.
The open letter said that when trust is broken through deception, when an individual places himself above the collective that entrusted him with authority, that duty has been abandoned.
“Leadership in football is not a possession. It is not about holding – or demanding – power to be held. It is a duty of service to the football family that entrusts it,” it added.
However, the latest attacks against world football’s governing body and Infantino go beyond football, said Herve Verhoosel, a former senior United Nations official and spokesperson.
Speaking to Twentytwo13, Verhoosel said Fifa still had 211 votes, but the politics behind them had just changed.
“The joint letter from the AFC, Concacaf and Uefa may have changed the political balance inside Fifa far more than its wording alone suggests,” said Verhoosel.
The FFE concept would see a new company created to manage the commercial and ticketing rights of all Fifa competitions, including the World Cups, with 21 per cent sold to a private investment company. It was quickly aborted following widespread criticism from several confederations, and even world leaders.
“Fifa remains an organisation of 211 member associations, each with one vote. That principle matters enormously – and until now it has been one of the strongest reasons not to assume that opposition from confederation leaders automatically translates into opposition from their individual members.
“But politics matters too. Once a confederation has publicly declared a ‘fundamental breach of trust’ with Fifa’s leadership, it becomes considerably more difficult for its individual associations – particularly smaller ones – simply to take the opposite position.
“They still have their vote. But the political cost of that vote has changed.”
Verhoosel said he continued to believe that what is happening at Fifa increasingly needs to be understood through the lens of multilateral politics as much as through football.
“I have spent much of my professional life watching international organisations operate through exactly this tension: formally equal members, regional blocs, alliances, influence, pressure and, ultimately, individual votes” he said.
“Fifa is different from the United Nations, of course. But the political mechanics are becoming remarkably familiar. And this leads to a more difficult question.
“At some point in an institutional crisis, the argument about who was originally right or wrong becomes secondary. What matters is whether sufficient trust remains for the institution to function effectively and in the wider public interest.
“After the intervention by three confederations, I increasingly struggle to see how the position of the Fifa president can remain politically tenable in the longer term.”
Verhoosel held senior communications and spokesperson positions with the UN and international organisations in New York, Geneva and Africa, including with the World Food Programme, WHO, UNITAID, OCHA and the UN peacekeeping mission in the Central African Republic, where he served as director of strategic communications.
Since leaving the United Nations, he has written and commented regularly on Fifa governance and the growing intersection between football, international politics and multilateral diplomacy.
He added that this was not a judgement on the merits of every allegation or disagreement, but a judgement about institutional reality.
“A president may still be able to assemble enough individual votes to survive. But surviving a vote and retaining the political authority to lead are not the same thing,” said Verhoosel.
“If a substantial part of the organisation no longer trusts its leadership, every major decision risks becoming another confrontation, every vote another test of loyalty and every initiative another battle between blocs.
“That is not sustainable – and, more importantly, it is not in the interests of world football.”
Verhoosel said the question facing Fifa’s 211 associations may therefore soon become larger than whether they support or oppose Infantino.
“It may be whether maintaining the status quo is still in the best interests of the institution they collectively own,” he added.
