By Ikebesi Omoding
In the accepted Western principles, once a person apologizes for his/her wrongdoing, he/she is exonerated from the shortcoming. And that person will be forgiven and can continue with the previously noted behaviour, as if nothing wrong had transpired.
The President of FIFA – the Federation of International Football Association – Mr. Gianni Infantino, recently did that apology when he convened a meeting of the association’ executive committee in Rabat, Morocco. Infantino was announcing that he had scrapped the idea of setting a private equity investment to control the commercial and operational rights to one of the globe’s biggest sporting events.
His hope is that FiFA’s 212 members will forget his action when he wanted the association to leave its normal business of being an association; and privatize the organization by selling its shares in the stock exchanges to private shareholders.
He did this after the just-concluded World Cup held in the USA, Canada and Mexico. Infantino was reportedly getting influenced by Mr. Joshua Kushner – the brother of Trump’s son-in-law, Mr. Jared.Kusher. The Kushners are the owners of Thrive Eternal (TE) – the American venture capital firm, an investor group that gets external investors who would have bought stakes in the association.
FIFA’s major football bodies that included the Unified European Football Association (UEFA), the Confederation of Central American Football Associations (CONCACAF), and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) strongly opposed Infantino’s move. Even some senior FIFA officials condemned Infantino.
Aside from the lack of transparency around the process, much of the criticism of FIFA’s Football Federation Enterprise (FFE), centered on the private investors purchasing 20% of FIFA’s shareholding. In an attempt to be seen as avoiding a conflict of i
