The answer is: not that much -- and there are two reasons.
First, the report is an
investigation into FIFA of the world governing body's decisions and
processes, conducted by Garcia who is paid by FIFA. The conclusions
reached are that there's really nothing to worry about when it comes to
FIFA. Surprise. Do you see the pattern here?
Second, while it wasn't nice to read what was written about me and it wasn't what I expected, it is also untrue.
Bonita Mersiades
I didn't expect to read
about any of the 75 individuals with whom Garcia met, let alone to see
Phaedra Al-Majid and me singled out in such negative terms.
Not only were the two of
us referred to as "whistle-blowers" in the pejorative, but I was
referred to as "unreliable" and Phaedra -- who worked on the successful
Qatar bid -- was referred to as both "not credible" and "unreliable."
It was an extraordinary and unprofessional attack by one or both of the two men who preside over FIFA's Ethics Committee.
While Eckert or Garcia
must have their reasons for so openly flouting standards of
whistle-blower conventions, the important point is they also accepted
the issues that I raised with them.
The issues that are
subsequently presented in the summary report related to Australia -- and
which Eckert refers to as "potentially problematic conduct" -- are
amongst the matters I discussed with Garcia.
For me, this is the key point as the real issue is FIFA.
In any case, as Garcia himself has claimed, it is also easy to find errors in the summary report.
For example, in the
section related to the former FIFA Executive Committee member, Mohamed
Bin Hammam, it is noted that Oceania Football Confederation's (OFC)
intention to support Australia's bid "was publicly reported as early as
October 17, 2010."
Wrong. It was announced by the President
of Australia's football association at a media conference, alongside
President Sepp Blatter, in Brisbane on June 1, 2008. This is a matter of public record.
It is curious that
either Garcia or Eckert got this date wrong by 28 months because it goes
to the heart of issues raised earlier in the summary report, and it is
also relevant to what appears to be an illogical conclusion regarding
the impact of Reynald Temarii's eventual absence from taking part in the final vote.
But while the focus of the past four years has been the decisions of the Executive Committee regarding 2018/2022, FIFA has been the subject of corruption allegations for decades.
Concerned about his
legacy after the 2018/2022 decisions, Blatter embarked upon successive
so-called governance reforms in 2011 that left most people shaking their
heads in disbelief.
First, he announced the establishment of a "Council of Wisdom" comprising Henry Kissinger, Placido Domingo and Johan Cruyff.
When it finally dawned
on Blatter that this wasn't his brightest idea, he invited Transparency
International and an independent Swiss governance expert, Professor Mark
Pieth to advise him.
Transparency
International later quit, raising questions over FIFA's commitment to
reform because Pieth was being paid by the world governing body.
Professor Pieth hung in there for more than two years but could not chip-away at the cultural change required in the organization.
A high-profile
anti-bribery expert who was a member of one of the new committees,
Alexandra Wrage, quit in 2013 telling the Guardian: "We all focus our
efforts where we can have an impact and I was not having an impact at
FIFA.
"It is important the organization you are dealing with is receptive to those efforts and receptive to change.
"The independent
governance committee put in a tremendous amount of work and effort
putting together some fairly uncontroversial recommendations which were
then knocked back," said Wrage, who is president of the non-profit
international anti-bribery group Trace.
FIFA has grown to become
an international commercial behemoth -- albeit an unaccountable one --
in Blatter's time and he has built the World Cup into one of the most
prestigious sporting event on the planet.
But it has been at the
expense of the reputation of world football and without regard for the
two key stakeholders of the game -- players and fans.
FIFA is incapable of
reforming itself -- and it is time for those of us who love the game and
who play the game to ask sponsors, broadcasters and governments to
intervene to give us a new world governing body now.
What football should
have is an international governing body that has the same level of
transparency and accountability that we expect of our governments, major
institutions and international organizations.
An international
governing body that is responsible to the many millions of people who
play the game and the billions who are fans; and one that meets
standards befitting an organization that will make a profit of $2 billion from the 2014 World Cup, according to Forbes.
Governments, sponsors
and broadcasters should demand an interim time limited administration,
led by an eminent person with a broad mandate to develop a new
constitution, governance arrangements and policies and to conduct new
elections -- in other words, an International Olympic Committee-like
reform.
Together with Al-Majid
I've been invited by British MP Damian Collins to help arrange a FIFA
reform conference in Brussels in January, which I hope will produce the
reforms that the IOC put into place.
Finally, another question I have been asked is whether I would do this again.
Being a whistle-blower means your life changes.
In my case, I raised my concerns internally but my employment was terminated.
It takes a toll
financially and emotionally. In a relatively small country like
Australia, you lose your livelihood; and, at my stage in life, the
financial security you were building for your family.
But we all need to consider how we want our lives measured. We all make choices.
In the case of FIFA, you
can play in the sandpit; you can leave your principles at the door; or
you can be prepared to be resilient and take the consequences from those
who desperately want to maintain the sinecures of the status quo.
Comments
Post a Comment