FIFA urged to postpone elections due to bribery scandal

[News_Editor]

FIFA urged to postpone elections due to bribery scandal

2011-06-01 07:02:25 GMT+7 (ICT)

LONDON (BNO NEWS) -- The English Football Association (FA) and the Scottish Football Association on Tuesday urged the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) to postpone presidential elections due to ongoing bribery scandal.

"We believe the election should be rescheduled to facilitate a period of consultation to deal with the issues that have arisen in recent weeks," said Scottish FA chief executive Stewart Regan. "The events of the last two days, in particular, have made any election unworkable."

On Wednesday, a voting is scheduled to elect the successor of FIFA President Joseph Blatter. On May 19, the English FA announced that it will abstain from participating in the elections due to concerns over the lack of transparency and accountability within the organization.

"The series of allegations relating to FIFA Executive Committee Members made it difficult to support either candidate," said FA Chairman David Bernstein. "We call on FIFA and ask other national associations to support us with two initiatives."

Bernstein called for support to postpone the elections to give credibility to the process as well as appointing an independent external body to make recommendations for improving governance and compliance procedures and structures within FIFA.

"This has been a very damaging time for the reputation of FIFA and therefore the whole of football. To improve confidence in the way the game is governed at the very top, we believe these requests would be a positive step forward," added Bernstein.

The international football organization has been recently on the spotlight due to alleged cash payments to FIFA delegates in the past designations of the hosts for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

Blatter is campaigning for being re-elected for a fourth term but his presidency has been recently marred with corruption allegations and doubts over the legitimacy of the World Cup bidding processes- He, however, claimed that FIFA was not in crisis.

A panel of the FIFA Ethics Committee cleared Blatter from the accusations of receiving payments from delegations during a special meeting of the Caribbean Football Union (CFU).

The same committee provisionally suspended on Sunday FIFA Vice-President Jack Warner and FIFA Executive Committee member Mohamed bin Hammam for alleged violations of the FIFA Code of Ethics in relation to the forthcoming presidential election.

In response, Warner published an e-mail in which FIFA Secretary-General Jerome Valcke suggested Bin Hammam bought the 2022 World Cup for the benefit of Qatar. He also threatened to reveal more 'dark' secrets from FIFA's governing body.

Valcke said that his e-email meant that the winning bid used their financial strength to lobby for support. He denied any bribery accusations or similar unethical behavior. He added that there is no investigation open regarding the 2022 FIFA World Cup host election.

Furthermore, the Ethics Committee examined the cases of two officials from the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) in relation to alleged violations to FIFA's ethics code. Debbie Minguell and Jason Sylvester were later provisionally suspended as well.

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