adminLAUSANNE. — With the deadline to submit bids for the FIFA presidency looming yesterday, reports that Asian football chief Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim al Khalifa has entered the race took the overall number of candidates to succeed Sepp Blatter to seven. Yesterday was the final day for candidates looking to take over the scandal-hit governing body of the world game to officially lodge their bids to enter the election which is scheduled for February 26.
Erstwhile favourite Michel Platini, the UEFA president who is currently suspended by FIFA, remains a contender pending an examination of his candidacy when his ban ends on January 5.
The Frenchman, who has been a member of FIFA’s Executive Committee since 2002, was suspended for 90 days on October 8 over a $2 million payment received from FIFA in 2011 without a written contract. Another potential pitfall is that FIFA’s electoral committee must judge the integrity of all candidates, and it remains to be seen if their evaluation will be influenced by Platini’s suspension.
Platini has had a first procedural appeal against a 90-day ban from all footballing activities rejected, representatives of the UEFA president revealed yesterday. “This decision is not that of the (FIFA) appeals committee, for which no date has yet been communicated to Platini,” the Frenchman’s counsel said in a statement.
His lawyers added that they are “convinced the appeals will eventually show his complete integrity and restore all his rights”. But by yesterday afternoon, Platini looked set to have five rivals, although more contenders were expected to come forward before the door slammed shut at midnight yesterday.
UEFA General Secretary Gianni Infantino was the latest person to announce that he was going to stand for the presidency of FIFA after receiving the backing of the Executive Committee of European football’s governing body yesterday.
“We are delighted that Gianni has agreed to stand,” said UEFA in a statement.
UEFA’s statement added: “He is in the process of submitting the required nominations and will issue a statement on his candidacy later today.”
UEFA did not clarify what Infantino’s candidacy means for Platini, the UEFA president who is also running for the FIFA leadership but is currently serving a 90-day ban from football.
The 49-year-old Bahraini royal Shaikh Salman, the head of the Asian Football Confederation since 2013, is the latest to come forward, with the Bahrain News Agency saying he registered his bid on Sunday.
Already familiar with FIFA from his role as a vice-president, he previously supported Platini’s bid. However, his chances of receiving the backing of European federations may not be helped by the fact he has been heavily criticised by human rights campaigners for his role in suppressing pro-democracy demonstrations in 2011.
Another heavyweight candidate to come forward is Tokyo Sexwale, the 62-year-old South African anti-apartheid campaigner who was once jailed alongside Nelson Mandela, serving 13 years of an 18-year jail term on Robben Island on terrorism charges.
His non-footballing background could serve as an asset but also as a handicap, given that it is the presidents of FIFA’s 209 member federations who elect the president. A member of South Africa’s 2010 World Cup bid team, he serves on FIFA’s anti-racism and anti-discrimination committee, likening racism to “a monster that is trying to infiltrate sporting fields”. He is also a FIFA media committee member.
The Jordanian Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein, the 39-year-old brother of Jordan’s King Abdullah, was the only adversary to Blatter at the election in May this year and can boast that he took the veteran Swiss to a second round of voting before withdrawing. But on that occasion he had the backing of UEFA, something he is unlikely to get this time following his criticism of Platini as being too closely connected to a “flawed system”. — AFP.
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