Working conditions for labourers in Qatar have been likened to slavery. Photo / AP
Working conditions for labourers in Qatar have been likened to slavery. Photo / AP
As NZ hosts U-20 World Cup, top Fifa officials are indicted and Qatar’s shocking safety record is highlighted.
Fifa has never lacked for self-love. Just a few days ago, football's governing body would have delighted at the thought of its favourite four-letter word emblazoned across the front page of the New Zealand Herald in the lead-up to the Fifa Under-20 World Cup.
But not like this. The plumage on the peacocks of world sports administration has been violently ruffled by the dramatic US indictment of nine top Fifa officials, among them the chairman of the Organising Committee for the New Zealand-hosted tournament, Jeffrey Webb.
The US Department of Justice does not mince words, charging that "corruption is rampant, systemic, and deep-rooted", that it "spans at least two generations of soccer officials who, as alleged, have abused their positions of trust to acquire millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks".
Accusations of sleaze and bribery have long plagued Fifa, but few predicted it would come to this. Sepp Blatter, the cartoonish, controversial and long-serving Fifa president, is not indicted, but as the leader and figurehead of an organisation facing an existential crisis, plainly he should stand down.
Blatter, however, is no mere mortal. At the time of writing he appeared still intent, incredibly, on winning a fifth term as president, in a vote scheduled, just as incredibly, for later today. We may even see him out here for the Under-20 semifinals.
Swiss prosecutors have separately announced a criminal investigation into hosting rights for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, which were awarded to Russia and Qatar in a bizarre process that involved near-simultaneous votes on consecutive tournaments. Even before this week's legal bombshells, there was ample evidence to demand new votes. Fifa, unsurprisingly, has covered its ears and howled out into the neighbouring Zurich zoo.
The successful Qatari bid was always most baffling. Fifa refused to publish a 350-page report into the process by which the tiny kingdom became host, instead releasing a nothing-to-see-here summary. The original report's author called the precis "incomplete and erroneous" and quit.
The truly bloodcurdling disgrace, however, is the death toll among foreign workers imported to construct the tournament edifices, most of which will be torn down when it's over.
Qatar is the world's wealthiest nation per capita (recent purchases include Canary Wharf in London and a record-breaking Gauguin painting). Of a population a touch over two million, only about 200,000 are citizens. For hundreds of thousands of migrant workers, many already exploited by mendacious "recruitment agents", this desert state is a hazardous, life-threatening place.
As many as 1200 workers from Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and elsewhere have been killed in Qatar's World Cup construction boom, estimates the International Trade Union Confederation, which last week characterised conditions as "simply slavery".
A year ago Qatar promised to improve workers' rights, but "in practice, there have been no significant advances", said the author of a new Amnesty International report.
"More than 1.5 million migrant workers ... remain at the mercy of their sponsors and employers."
Football's governing body had "yet to demonstrate any real commitment to ensuring Qatar 2022 is not built on a foundation of exploitation and abuse".
To many of the migrant labourers - not least the Nepali nationals who this week were denied leave to attend funerals for family members killed in the earthquake - the Qatari peninsula, which juts out of Saudi Arabia and into the Persian Gulf, must look like a raised middle finger.
It might be said that Qatar and Fifa deserve one another. Maybe, but they don't deserve to be running the showpiece of the world's most popular sport. A number of sponsors, among them Visa, adidas and Coca-Cola, last week publicly expressed concern about the plight of workers in Qatar. Especially in the wake of this week's prosecutions, it's hard to see how they can conscionably stay involved with a bloodstained competition.
All of which shows last month's suggestion by Martin Snedden that New Zealand might team up with senior partner Australia to bid for a football World Cup to be serendipitous. It's not completely far-fetched an idea.
Australia's 2022 bid (since tainted, too) had been considered a favourite. New Zealand can boast successful cricket and rugby world cup hosting successes.
And tomorrow, the Under-20 World Cup begins. What an opportunity to show visiting team officials around the place, as well as those Fifa panjandrums who still plan to enjoy our hospitality. Without the whiff of anything underhand, we might suggest that the embattled custodians of the so-called beautiful game could begin the process of restoring their Blattered reputations down here, starting with recognising that fresh votes must be held. It has been a terrible week for Fifa, but history may well recall it as a great week for football.
Having trouble getting your head around the Saudi flying sheep scandal that has seen opposition MPs cry "bribery"? Essentially it goes like this:
Al-Khalaf he had an export business (e-i-e-i-o) And in that business he exported sheep to Saudi (e-i-e-i-o) With a baa-baa here and a baa-baa there, here a baa, there a baa, shipped out to Arabia Al-Khalaf he had an export business (e-i-ho-ho-ho).
Al-Khalaf he had a problem (e-i-e-uh-oh) The Labour lot banned live sheep exports (this was 12 years ago) With a wah-wah here and a wah-wah there, Al-Khalaf said that's not fair Al-Khalaf he had a problem (e-i-here-we-go)
Old McCully had a problem (e-i-oh-hello) And on that problem he poured millions of dollars (e-i-e-oh-no) With a legal threat here and a Gulf trade pact there, here a deal, there a deal, everywhere a significant impediment in the bilateral relationship and baseline saving reallocated to NZ Inc leveraging initiatives Old McCully had an agribusiness hub (a-e-i-o-u)
Al-Khalaf he had a farm (e-i-e-i-o) And on that farm he had some sheep (900 or so) With a haere-ra here, and an inshallah there, they flew to Saudi Fleecy-Air Al-Khalaf he had a farm, hundreds of pregnant ewes, several million New Zealand taxpayer dollars and, who knows, probably a jolly good laugh at our expense (and no one will know).
