Further to my earlier post on the failed England World Cup Bid and the revelation, by Martin Samuels, of the agreement, by our politicians, to allow the laws of this country to be circumnavigated by the FIFA mafia.
I read, in the Mail on Sunday, that Boris Johnson has taken revenge on ‘Don Corleone’ Blatter and the other FIFA delegates who destroyed England’s bid to host the World Cup by kicking them out of London’s Dorchester hotel for the 2012 Olympic Games.
“FIFA president Mr Blatter and his team had been invited to stay in exclusive £1,000-a-night suites at the five-star hotel for more than a week during the Olympics.
This was part “of the charm offensive” designed to woo FIFA in the run-up to Thursday’s 2018 World Cup vote.But London Mayor Mr Johnson, the official host of the Olympics, has withdrawn the offer to demonstrate his fury at the way FIFA threw out England’s bid”
Forget ‘charm offensive’. We are accusing almost everyone and anyone of corruption. But was this not corruption, pure and simple? How on earth can anyone linked with our bid now claim that we are morally superior? We were in the business of ‘buying’ votes! We did not, obviously, offer enough!
We do need, as a matter of urgency, to take a look at ourselves. Let us have a full and frank Enquiry, chaired by an independent person with absolutely no links to football in particular or sport in general, into our bidding process from beginning to end.
Asking every member of the process from the President to the office cleaner, Who was approached in an effort to assist our bid and what was offered and what FIFA demanded. If, as it appears, Lord Triesmann was correct and members of our bid believed that the process was 'bent' WHY did we not withdraw then?
Let us remember that the good name of our country, England, is at stake and a lot of public money was used in this wasted exercise. The Enquiry should then make recommendations for the future direction of the Football Association of England.
BUT there is a real need for a thorough clean sweep of the Football Association well before we can call for the sewers of FIFA to be well and truly cleaned!
Strapworld.
But London Mayor Mr Johnson, the official host of the Olympics, has withdrawn the offer to demonstrate his fury at the way FIFA threw out England’s bid.
Strapworld,
ReplyDeleteAttempting to compare hotel rooms for delegates to seven figure bribes is a departure from reality. On the one hand, hotel rooms and FIFA tax breaks are not shrouded in secrecy. On the other, millions of pounds paid to each Exco member is carefully funnelled through secret offshore trusts based in Mauritius and the Caribbean as it represents corruption on a massive scale and is (for what it's worth) illegal according to FIFA rules.
It is completely legitimate practice in the world of lobbying and business to offer perks to your quarry. All large companies take their customers on "jollies" often to foreign countries. It is illegal though to pay personal bribes. It is naive to try and compare the two.
Foreign businesses are offered tax incentives to locate in the UK as they are in many countries of the world. This is not "circumnavigation" of UK laws. This is an example of legislation created to make the UK more competitive. This is not corruption, but the way international business works. Now if the CEO were to be paid millions into an offshore trust, shrouded in secrecy, to locate the company that he works for in the UK - that would be corruption.
As it happens, the contract that FIFA requires all bidding parties to sign, includes clauses requiring the host country to offer FIFA tax breaks. This is not secret and it is a decision that a government has to make when deciding to make a bid. Clearly, the UK Government decided the pros outweighed the cons. Just as they decided that the pros of offering foreign companies tax breaks outweighed the cons.
You may disagree with the decision to go ahead with the bid, and many would agree. But to call the FA corrupt in the same breath as FIFA is blatant nonsense.
I am no fan of the FA, and would love the FA to be overhauled from top to bottom, but not because they are corrupt (as there is zero evidence for this), but because they are totally incompetent. And the charges of corruption and incompetence are two totally different things.
On this blog, I am used to reading the excellent and articulate views of James Ryddel. I am surprised he has allowed the quality of correspondence to plunge to such depths.
Julian