Fifa scraps controversial investment plan
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This is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service.
I'm Pete Ross, and in the early hours of Saturday 1st August, these are our main stories. FIFA scraps its controversial plan to sell stakes in its competitions to private investors after global outrage. And the head of a tech company hacked by a rogue AI agent calls for greater accountability. Also in this podcast, a discovery in the Amazon rainforest sheds new light on ancient indigenous civilisations and... We found one case where a capuchin monkey adopted a little marmoset monkey. Or there was a case of a macaque monkey who made friends with a chicken. The unlikely friendships forged in the animal world. It's nearly two weeks since the men's World Cup final, but it seems football's world governing body FIFA has never left the news.
In a dramatic development, FIFA's president Gianni Infantino says he's scrapping controversial plans to sell off stakes in the World Cup and other competitions to private investors. Following widespread opposition from both within FIFA and from regional confederations, Mr Infantino said the proposal had created division within the sport. James Franey is a journalist with the New York Post newspaper. He's been speaking to Helena Humphrey. This was a question of politics really killing this deal. The numbers simply didn't add up. When you had UEFA come out against the privatisation plan just yesterday, you had the spectacle where... Many big stars like Jude Bellingham, Kylian Mbappe wouldn't have been present at the next World Cup in 2030, which is being hosted, may I say, by Spain and Portugal as well as Morocco.
So it just wasn't workable as soon as UEFA came out with that statement. This plan was already on the rocks and we got the confirmation earlier this afternoon that investors had pulled out, leaving Infantino with really nowhere to go, Helena.
James, tell us more about that. What did your sources tell you about how this collapsed, essentially?
Indeed. So we spoke to many people across European soccer federations, Wall Street investors. This was really, as I've just said in my previous answer, a question of optics. No one would dispute that the game of football is all about making money. We know that from the Premier League. We know that from the UEFA Champions League. But the way that FIFA went about it is what basically killed this deal dead on arrival. The clubs, the federations, the fans died. It was just the global outcry against Infantino's plan with, may I say, his own number two saying he wasn't even aware of it. It just left him really with no choice just to fold as he did in the statement that he released. I think the question now is what this means for Infantino's leadership of FIFA.
Can he go on or will there be some kind of leadership challenge at the next presidential election?
And what is the sense that you've been getting on that front as you've been speaking to different people about the level of confidence or discontent with his leadership in light of this?
As you've seen from the statements that have come out from federations, this is almost universal. As I said in my first answer, when UEFA came out with that statement that they weren't going to be present in the next 2030 World Cup, it was really already game over, I would say. You also had CONCACAF. Follow up with that saying, you know, even the US National Federation saying that this really wasn't what they were going to support. I don't know, frankly, based on my reporting, who could challenge Infantino at this point. But it's fair to say that his leadership is in crisis tonight. It's probably the darkest period in FIFA's 122 year history, given what's been going on.
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Chapters
4 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–6:44
2
Why did FIFA abandon its plan to sell World Cup stakes to private investors?
6:44–15:14
3
What opposition from UEFA and regional federations helped collapse FIFA's privatisation plan?
15:14–23:18
4
Could Gianni Infantino's leadership survive the fallout from the investment proposal?
23:18–29:29
Speakers
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