FIFA congress, presidential elections and subsequent events

[mongrel]

http://www.theguardian.com/uk

14 officials have been charged with corruption and other white collar crime charges by the US Department of Justice, nine of whom are current or former Fifa executives in what is described as a “World Cup of fraud”. . All could face up to 20 years in prison. 'There is a parallel investigation by Swiss Authorities in what in many people's view is the seemingly dodgy bidding race for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, which were awarded to Russia and Qatar respectively in December 2010. The cost in human lives in preparing for the Qatar games could be around 1,200 deaths so far. No-one has been held into account for this massive death toll. I for one will boycott this event.


Sepp Blatter the FIFA President is seeking to be re-elected to another term this Friday . I think it should be postponed. More than that, I think anyone who cares about the sport should pressure on the sponsors to have Blatter defenestrated from FIFA, for the Qatar decision alone, let alone presiding over this farce. I am also wondering whether UEFA and and the other regional football associations should form a new body of its own, as I don't think FIFA is worth saving.
.

[Kraut and Tea]

I talked with a mod about this for a day or two about if it would be apropriate to have a thread concerning this subject in this forum. I do think that the sleaze and political involement that has been circling arround FIFA for the past 20 years do warrant a discussion in the politics thread. But should, as this conversation continues, I be proven wrong then this thread will be moved or closed.

By the way... I asked the mods a day before what went down in Switzerland today, as such this thread will not just cover that but various things.

I should also add. I might be the wrong person to open a thread on this subject. I have been following FIFA scandals since 2010 and have been part of protests against Sepp Blatter. I have also followed the subject very closely for a year now and believe me when I tell you that for the last 8-9 months there has been a scandal almoust every single week. So I might not be neutral enought to present the OP and possibly have to much information than can be compressed.

The 65th FIFA congress will be held in Zürich this week between the 28th and 29th of may. All 209 football national federations which are members of FIFA will gather there to discuss and vote on various issues and the FIFA presidency. The big issues this time are a Palestinian motion to have Israel suspended from FIFA and the FIFA presidency.
The Palestinian motion will most likely fail completly but the presidential election is what is getting most of the coverage. The candidates are the long time president Sepp Blatter and his opponent the Jordanian prince Ali bin Hussain. Two more candidates had run for office but pulled out of the race, Luis Figo and Michael van Praag.
Every single member of FIFA gets one vote that counts exactly as much as the vote of every other nation.
Which leads to the weird situation where a vote by the football powerhouse, famous for it`s inspireing league, feared by Brazil and Argentina alike, which produced hundreds of legendary players and is known, feared and loved all arround the the world - Vanatu... counts as much as a vote by Brazil, Argentina, Germany or Italy.

On Sepp Blatter and his friends:

And this part of the system is what Sepp Blatter relies on for his powerbase. When he was elected in 1998, his election was surrounded by rumors of corruption and bribery. What followed during his rule was that he remanaged the FIFA funds into a slush funding system. He divides the big money pot into slush funds which can contain up to millions of dollars and then hands them out to the smaller federations, without accountability and purely when he wants to. Those who receive the funds then always turn up to vote for him. Through this, Sepp Blatter has secured himself the votes of almoust all micronations on the planet, from Oceania to the Carebian. This has lead to weird situations where stadiums that could host up to 20 000 people, were built in pacific island nations where a football game will never atract that many people. But the building of those stadiums have brought in jobs for local councilmen and politicians who are often involved in the national football federation - and then show their appreciation by voting Blatter. So through this kind of deals, Blatter has secured himself.

His other big friends are the African nations. Blatter brought a world cup to Africa and makes slush funds widely available fro many African football federations. Problem here is that slush funds have often disapeard into private accounts. The Kenyan football federation is in fact currently under investigation for corruption after several hundred thousand dollars from a FIFA slush fund went missing. Many other high and low ranking figures in African football federations are also under suspicion or investigation for corruption.

Most of these slush funds are by the way handled by middlemen who manage FIFA affairs for entire regions. One of the most notorious of those middle men must be Jack Warner. He was the head of the Carebian football federations and FIFA vice president. Funds from the slush fund regulary went missing under his survailance. During the 2006 world cup he was also involved in a shady deal concerning world cup broadcasting rights in the Caribean - where alot of money went missing, in my opinion the most disgusting piece of sleaze involving him was when he was given donated money to hand over to Haiti earthquake victims and to rebuild parts of the destroyed Haitian football inferstructure and 90% of those donated funds went missing. You probably heard of him in the aftermaph of the last FIFA congress, when it was revealed that he was bribed by the Qataris to vote for their 2022 bid and tried to bribe other FIFA members into voting for Bin Haman as FIFA president. An arrest warrant for various charges, including fraud and corruption was put out for him today by the US and Swiss federal attorneys.

Asia is another place where Blatter finds his friends. Better put South West Asia... better still the Arab gulf states. Despite Bin Hamman (the head of the Asian football confederation and FIFA executive comitte member) having tried to overthrow Blatter in 2011 and failing miserably whilest being expelled fro corruption. Blatter is still very popular in the region. His slush funds are widely available to many and FIFA is making alot of money with various sponsorship dealings involving the gulf states. Similar to FIFA itself the Asian football confederation is mired in aligations of sleaze, shady dealings and corruption. But with nobody taking on the organisation and few seeming to have the motivation to see things cleaned up, things stay as they are. The AFC headquaters were moved to Bahrain by it`s new Bahraini president (who is also surrounded by corruption alligations) and not much gets out to the public from there. The last press leak that was revealed concerned Australia and Iran. No Arab nation has been to a world cup since 2002 and since Australia joined the AFC, Asian football has been dominated by the 4 teams that are the best in Asia: Japan, Australia, Iran and South Korea... with China becoming ever more stronger and better in recent years. All whilest Arab gulf nations are rather underwhelming. The recent press leak from early this year revealed that various people within the gulf nation football federation are considering to conspire against Australia and Iran, by having Australia kicked out of Asia and sanctioning Iranian football.
If you cant beat them, you..... destroy them through a bureocratic process?
Anyway.... I am trying to be neutral here... but of all the continental football federations, the Asian one has to be the worst, especialy since it`s leadership was taken over by the Arab gulf states.


The 2022 bid

That bid pritty much burst it all open. If there was ever a point at which various confederations, federations, politicians, journalists and justices started to get more interested in the backroom dealings of FIFA it was after that event. Since then, not only has the world cup in Qatar been shown to be a fiasco in terms of working rights and logistics, but FIFA itself was revealed to have been surrounded by sleaze surrounding the decision. 9 of the the 22 people who voted on that decision have been revealed to be corrupt, are being investigated for corruption or are facing criminal charges releating to corruption. FIFA however consistantly dismissed this arguing that it was individual exectuives who were corrupt and not FIFA itself, adding to that FIFAs line of defense is that as long as a majority of the 22 executive comitee members are not shown to have been corrupt - the corruption that existed was irrelevant. To put this into perpective: FIFA argues that in an election in which 36% of the vote were corrupted - the corruption is irrelevant because it wasnt 51% of the vote that were corrupted.
Leaks by an insider provided more evidence of corruption surrounding the bid, but FIFA refused to take that evidence into account. After the whiselblowers identety was revealed she reveived threats and only recently started giving more information, including corruption allegations involving various members of the African football conferderation CAF. Another blow to FIFA was whn the event was revealed to be moved to winter, thereby disrupting all national and international leagues aswell as the 2023 African championship. The comotion and logistical challenges that will result out of this decision are bound to bring trouble especialy by European federations. The cooling technology that Qatar promissed, apparently never really existed and despite bidding for a summer tournament - Qatar still gets to stage the event. Another recent logistical problem is tourist acomedation. The Qataris suddently found out that most football fans cant afford the luxury hotels which Qatar built so enthusiasticly. So the organisers are now thinking of having them housed in the UAE or in cruise ships.
As a result of this FIFA hired a pannel of anti corruption advisers who usualy work in deconstruction corruption and kleptocracy within big corporations. As FIFA announced improvements, the advisors quit the organisation in frustration claiming that FIFA was only interested in cosmetics but not in actual change.
Micheal Platini is so far the only member of the FIFA executive commitee who came out publicly as having voted for Qatar and being supportive of the move. But many suspect that his public support of Qatar might be a tactic to divert any attention that might be directed towards if he received bribes or was part of financial dealings. Mainly because after the 2022 bid, Platini and then French president Sarkozy had invited the Emir of Qatar to France and had a private dinner with him. Qatar had signed a massive multi billion gas and energy deal with the French government and many suspect that this shows political conflation within Platinis decision making.
The biggest farce however has to be the Garcia report. Michael Garcia is the former district attorney of New York, who was hired and tasked by FIFA to conduct an investigation into FIFA corruption alligations. After several months he finished his report and handed it over to the FIFA ethics comitee. The ethics commite however summerised the 430 page report by Garcia into a fiew pages, published that small summery and claimed that FIFA was cleared of any corruption. Garcia blasted that approach and denounced the summery as misleading towards his actual findings. The FIFA executive commitee was forced to agree to publish the full report later, but will only do so after Garcia has finished conducting more interviews, which could take months.
It might be less politics but sports releated - but I think it is worth noting that the Qatari football federation has started a big mercenery program recruiting young foreign boys to play football for Qatar. Non of those are Qatari immigrants to abroad or foreign immigrants to Qatar. Most are simply foreign football players who receive money and citizenship for a place in the Qatar national team. Currently the Qatari football academy is also under suspicion as it has been extensively recruiting young kids with talent from Africa and easter Europe in exchange for paying their parents up to 5000$ a month. As it stands the Qatari football national team consists of 2 French, 1 Congolese, 1 Egyptian, 1 Ghanean, 1 Algerian, 1 Sudanese, 1 Bahraini, 1 Kuwaiti and 1 Senegalese players who are all recently naturalised citizens. FIFA only commented that it is " concerned and observing" the situation... but I have no clue what that means.

Qatar Slavery and Human rights

I could have included this in Qatar 2022, but think it is to important to be made a sub part. It is somehow disturbing when people complain more about the disruption of the national leagues when Qatar is building it`s world cup with slaves. At the center of this scandal is the "kafalar" system. The gulf states abolished slavery in 1979 and after that interduced this system which is widespread across the entire region. Under it, a foreign worker will have to give up his passport, sign a contract with his employer and can only leave the country with the permission of his or her employer. This system is used in Qatar to hold workers in conditions which have to be described as slavery. Workers sometimes end up working months without anykind of pay. Are beaten and mistreated in other ways by their employers. An live under the most inhumane and disgusting conditions that no human being should have to live under. The death rates of these workers are extraordenary high and under the current rate 64 workers will have died for every single game played at the 2022 world cup. Most of those workers are from Nepal and other poor countries who were lured into Qatar by middlemen promissing high wages and wealth.
This was first exposed by the guardian newspaper. And rather than puting any effort into changing the situation, Qatar has resorted to arresting any journalist who comes to close to the labour camps. Only last week a crew of BBC journalists were arrested in Qatar for filming workers - after being invited by Qatar to film workers. A German film crew had also been arrested 2 months ago. In both cases the equiptment belonging to the journalists had been destroyed, material deleted and they had been held in custody for several days without having their respective embesseys informed.
International labour unions, journalists and human rights organisations have so far had the guts to call this situation out. Because governments that complain about FIFA could end up getting suspended from FIFA. Last week was a novum, as the Nepalese government probably became the first government ever to openly critizise Qatar. After the devastating earthquake in Nepal, the Qataris prevented Nepalese workers from trying to reach their families or traveling home and is by the way still doing so, which lead to the Nepalese government condeming Qatar and FIFA.
The FIFA sponsors such as adidas, Coca Cola and Visa have recently also been put under more and more pressure to voice their concerns and make use of their financial power.
The remaining human rights situation is also not to pritty. Gender segregated stadiums, strickt alcohol restricitons, women have to cover up, no free press, homosexuals are executed and on and on and on and on. Laws regarding various things in Qatar are very strickt. It is for example forbidden to enter the country as a double citizen (which is a way to try to keep all israelis out) and if you are found to be a dual national you are deported. The most redicilous of all has to be that if you hold your wifes or girlfriends hand in public (let alone kiss her) you can end up with a big fine or even flogged. Imagine all of that forced onto up to 1 million football fans?

Brazil 2014

It is fair to say that this world cup played a big role in unmasking FIFA. Eventhough it was the best world cup since 1970, it was marred in discontent and protest. The Brazilian government forced into spending billions for white elephant stadiums and inferstructure used for only one summer whilest all the profits from the even went to FIFA. Severe budget cuts were made into education and healthcare. And whilest the Brazilian government was having it`s problems with corruption and a faltering economy despite the world cup aswell, FIFA essentialy poured salt into that open wound as the Brazilian people had to watch it`s government spending billions needed elsewhere on FIFA.
In the aftermaph of this world cup many were also suspicious over the activities of the Brazilian football FA, and it was only revaled last week that the FA had made some very shady dealings with Saudi marketing companies. And today, the former president of the Brazilian FA and member of the FIFA comitee was arrested and served a warrant for corruption by US authorities.

Russia 2018

Under all the chaos involving FIFA and Qatar 2022, the criticims concerning Russia 2018 somewhat tuned down. And it seemd for a very long time that only the English were complaining because they didnt host 2018 themselves. The Russian bidding team had destroyed the documents and computers releating to the bidding process, so if anything corrupt did happen it probably wouldnt be revealed. The only possibly shady dealings involving a executive comitee meber revolved arround Franz Beckenbauer. Who was an executive member at the time and made a buisness deal with Russian gas giant Gasprom shorty after the bidding process. But overall, many seemd to have accepted a world cup in Russia as something that wouldnt be to bad and 100% better than anything that Qatar could ever do.
Big criticism of Russia 2018 really started to explode after the Ukraine conflict flaired up and especialy after the downing of Malaysia Arlines MH17. Voices calling for a boycott of the event started coming from the US, Netherlands and Germany. But the fact that these are mainly calling for a boycott and not a revote, underline that the Russian world cup is likely to be accepted by most, whilest Qatar is what sucks up most of the criticism.

What is changing?

South American and North American federations also used to be friends of Blatter. With the Caribean managed by the before mentioned Jack Warner, the US federation managed by a disgraced corrupt president and the South American FAs being notorious for their corruption. Brazilian football especialy still is a marred and corrupted swamp. Argentina is starting to clean itself up, but used to be run by a president and FIFA vice president Don Julio Gordona who was surrounded by corruption alligations and was infamous remarks, like going on Argentine national tv in an interview and saying "jews will never referee Argentine games, because jews dont know what hard work is". But things are changing in the Americas. With maybe the exception of Brazil, South American football really does seem to want to clean itself up and get rid of all the muck. The US investigated and are trialing all their former football officials involved in corruption and the Carebian recently announced, after ridding themselves of Jack Warner, that the support for Blatter is no longer guaranteed. Pritty much the only nation in all of the Americas that completly supports Blatter is Honduras and that is mainly because of the slush funds given to them.
Europe has been in open revolt against Blatter for the past 4 years. There are some who may argue that parts of Eastern Europe still support him, but I doubt that. But the Americas and Europe are not enought votes to overthrow Blatter. It would take either several additional African or Asian nations to get the votes needed to overthrow Blatter. But both Asia and Africa seem to be comfortable with him. I predict that Blatter will win the election again and it looks like most in Europe and the Americas know this.
So what is changing is that the continental confederations are more and more turning their attention away from FIFA and focusing on their own backyard. Platini wants to expand the European championships to 32 teams to become an event that could even rival the world cup, whilest still putting more and ore money and effort into the European leagues.
South and North America are increasingly working together and will try to create their own things. With a cross continental tournament planned for 2016 and suggestion revolving arround a proposed North-South American champions league, things are also slowly moving more and more away from FIFA. I believe, that FIFA will not change, certainly not soon. And because FIFA under Blatter is so much focused on places like Bahrain, Vanatu, Micronesia, Qatar and Samoa... the actual powerhouses of the port will turn away from the corruption and politics of FIFA and focuse more on their own things.

The recent FBI investigations and arrests will, I believe also not change much... eventhough I hope things will change.

Sources:

I have giant load of sources... like mentioned I have been following this for years. I am likely to update my sources to add more links:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

http://uk.businessinsider.com/fifa-c...up-2015-5?r=US

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035880.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035883.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035767.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035867.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035720.html

http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/po...ke-126976.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035817.html

http://www.spiegel.de/sport/fussball...a-1035781.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3SF51Fo07E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5R9Ur44XV8

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-32775563

http://www.southasia.com.au/?p=1918

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...er-earthquakes

http://www.fastcompany.com/1709955/q...g-cruise-ships

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...for-Qatar.html

http://www.sportsgrid.com/media/alch...up-2022-qatar/

http://www.theguardian.com/world/201...tions-answered

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...orruption.html

http://www.espnfc.com/fifa-world-cup...on-allegations

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...n-scandal.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...-the-vote.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qm-q75Z1NUs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xztgiU_qra0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bTGCt19J5Y

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPNR6o3qRbw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VaZZn1AZdNo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9x98SE-dfM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4zKnQsSFaU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HUryLCdoiA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN_75vgStnQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buo3FruX0UU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVSd9zoosMw

What do you think?

Is FIFA going to change?
Will the recent arrests and investigations bring change?
Will Blatter be reelected?
How much corruption can an organisation take until it collapses?
What will it take to change FIFA?
Could Ali Bin Hussain change FIFA?
Will it take government involvement to change FIFA?
Will Qatar still be stripped of 2022?
Will the continental confederations focuse more on their own stuff?


..........Will you start watching rugby if things get worse?

[baradona]

I agree with you that Blatter needs to step down because his already been in that position from 1998. To be honest, I feel that FIFA organization got worse during his time as of more bribery and corruption. I think that every regional football association have a lot of corruption especially Africa. I do not see any change in the way Africa being ruled issa hayatou. I think FIFA is not doing the job they are supposed to be doing anymore to prevent corruption and referees getting paid. I say that because Africa has the worst referees and FIFA absolutely does nothing about it. It is time for new fresh faces who are serious about change and preventing teams from getting advantage of other small teams.

[Kraut and Tea]

lol... you beat me to it. I shouldnt have spent 2 days asking a mod if it was ok to post this and 2 hours trying to explain everything in detai:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...tial-elections

I followed stories surrounding FIFA corruption for 4 years and agree with every word you say. But not only does Blatter have to go in my opinion. I think FIFA need to be strpped of parts of it`s power and oversight given to continental federations. Moving FIFA out of Switzerland into a more transparent country with more legal oversight would probably also not be a bad idea.

They literaly have only one single job: Manage a tournament!!!!

I am pritty sure the rest can be managed well enought by the continental confederations.

I guess our threads will get merged soon.

[mongrel]

lol... you beat me to it. I shouldnt have spent 2 days asking a mod if it was ok to post this and 2 hours trying to explain everything in detai:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...tial-elections

I followed stories surrounding FIFA corruption for 4 years and agree with every word you say. But not only does Blatter have to go in my opinion. I think FIFA need to be strpped of parts of it`s power and oversight given to continental federations. Moving FIFA out of Switzerland into a more transparent country with more legal oversight would probably also not be a bad idea.

They literaly have only one single job: Manage a tournament!!!!

I am pritty sure the rest can be managed well enought by the continental confederations.

I guess our threads will get merged soon.

No objection to the threads being merged, your details certainly add weight to the discussion.

[MathiasOfAthens]

Very interesting. What are the odds that the current president loses?

[Gaidin]

Depends on if they can vote while under arrest as extradition is being worked out. 36ish hours and counting.

[removeduser_487563287433]

This is good:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32856629

ing amazing work by the USA here. Let's tear this crap apart.

[Dante Von Hespburg]

Threads merged. Some very interesting and quality posts here. Continue ladies and gents.

[Pielstick]

On the subject of labour conditions in Qatar...

It's not just Qatar and not just the World Cup.

Anybody who has been to Dubai cannot have failed to notice the number of labourers from the sub-continent working there in what amounts to appalling conditions. My ship was having a maintenance period in Dubai, and I was sent to the premises of one of the contractors to oversee the work being done on stuff taken off the ship for repair/overhaul. It was a large heavy engineering workshop filled with Indians, none of whom appeared to have any personal protective equipment, the safety standards in the workshop were non-existant (I saw several examples of people operating machinery incorrectly and unsafely). The thing is, this company was contracted by the Ministry of Defence, so our tax is being used to pay these companies running these operations.

Ten years ago I spent four months in a shipyard in Singapore that was filled by and large with workers from India and Sri Lanka - these guys worked long hours in horrible conditions and a lot of them slept rough in the shipyard at night. At the entrance to the shipyard was a big sign proudly saying the shipyard had X million man hours with no major injuries.... that's because under Singapore law they have something like 24 hours to report an accident/injury - if one of these guys got hurt they would bundle him off out the country ASAP so they wouldn't have to report it. Again, this shipyard had been contracted by the Ministry of Defence to the tune of millions of pounds to refit two British naval vessels.

So yeah, whilst it's all good and well taking a stand with the Qatar and the World Cup, it runs a lot deeper than just that country and that event.

[Heinz Guderian]

This is good:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32856629

ing amazing work by the USA here. Let's tear this crap apart.

i agree, sometimes the Americans do some of the stuff we cant/wont really well. Well done them.

[caratacus]

On the subject of labour conditions in Qatar...

It's not just Qatar and not just the World Cup.

So yeah, whilst it's all good and well taking a stand with the Qatar and the World Cup, it runs a lot deeper than just that country and that event.

If one dares shine a torch on any large organisation like FIFA and its relationship with governments and big business, there will be corruption scandals of similar if not greater magnitude.

What is shocking,is why these dealings have been so slow to be uncovered! Why does it take the FBI who work for a country not greatly involved in football to "start the ball rolling" as it were!!. Could the staging of the event in Russia in 2018 have something to do with it,I wonder.This den of rogues has remained unchallenged for years in Europe the home of Football. Why as that great institution the European Union not done anything similar and it takes the Swiss to begin proceedings!

Those involved in these investigations are easily isolated despite their greedy and corrupt networking. Those involved in other organisation that are far more deeply meshed in more powerful and influential decision making, are not so easily isolated and the torch of light will never be shone upon their faces.

[removeduser_487563287433]

Sorry but I don't think we should pretend the level of corruption in FIFA is normal.

[caratacus]

Sorry but I don't think we should pretend the level of corruption in FIFA is normal.

I'm sorry that some of us are confident of knowing otherwise.

[removeduser_487563287433]

lol what does that even mean? What corruption have you experienced?

[caratacus]

lol what does that even mean? What corruption have you experienced?

A man who believes there is no corruption were money lies and dare I say, were politics and money combine, is a fool. But judging by the lack of inertia in rooting it out, I guess there are many fools around.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Extract taken from the book "Football is War" The EU limits and opportunities to control FIFA by Arnout Geeraert

Since FIFA aims to have a constructive dialogue with the EU institutions, particularly the Commission, in an effort to consolidate favourable regulatory treatment, the EU seems to be in a unique position to influence FIFA’s conduct. Yet it fails to exploit its potential in full. EU institutions are highly respectful of sport organizations’ autonomous regulation of sport and FIFA has important means for mitigating EU control. Only when the EU demonstrates a comparable degree of proactive behaviour can it increase its leverage over FIFA

[Condottiere 40K]

17882
The timing seems suspicious, and probably scheduled for effect.

The only way you could reform international football is for UEFA and the South Americans to secede and rebuild.

[Kraut and Tea]

As to be expected, the benefitiaries of the FIFA slush fund system stick to the man who made the current situation possible.

The Asian AFC confederation announced today from it`s headquaters in Bahrain that it will stick to Blatter.

I do however have hope that some federations in Asia, particulary those of Japan, South Korea, Australia, Iran, India and China have had enought of this corrupt organisation.

Edit:

And now the Southern African regional federation have announced that they will stick to Blatter..........

This is hopeless. It looks certain now that the elections will take place anyway and that Blatter will get reelected.

The only hope is that North America, South America and Europe decide to boycott the congress and demand it to be reschedueld.

[snuggans]

Visa and Coca Cola are threatening FIFA now, possible sponsorship domino effect?

[Vítor Gaspar]

Visa and Coca Cola are threatening FIFA now, possible sponsorship domino effect?

They're basically the only ones (and, indirectly, the consumers) with real weight to change things. Hopefully sponsors will start to boycott FIFA.