Fifa’s credibility in tatters as chief investigator quits

THE credibility of Fifa’s World Cup corruption inquiry lay in tatters this week after its chief investigator quit in protest at its attempts to suppress his findings.

Michael J Garcia resigned from the governing body’s ethics committee on Wednesday, 24 hours after losing an appeal against the decision by co-chairman Hans-Joachim Eckert to clear Russia and Qatar to host the next two tournaments.

Plunging Fifa into deeper crisis ahead of an executive committee meeting in Marrakesh, where a vote is scheduled on whether Garcia’s report should be released, the American accused football’s governing body and its president Sepp Blatter of showing a lack of leadership and said he had lost confidence in Eckert’s independence.

The American attorney also revealed that Fifa’s executive committee had attempted to have him disciplined over his calls for the full 430-page report to be published.

Garcia has apparently been considering resigning for some time, with the refusal of Fifa’s appeals committee to pursue his claim that Eckert’s 43-page summary con- tained “numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations of facts and conclusions” proving the final straw.

Garcia said: “It now appears that, at least for the foreseeable future, the Eckert decision will stand as the final word on the 2018-22 Fifa World Cup bidding process.

“No independent governance committee, investigator or arbitration panel can change the culture of an organisation.

“And while the Eckert decision [on November 13] made me lose confidence in the independence of the adjudicatory chamber, it is the lack of leadership on these issues within Fifa that leads me to conclude that my role in this process is at an end. Accordingly I am resigning as independent chairman of the investigatory chamber of the Fifa ethics committee.”

Eckert felt that Garcia had not unearthed enough evidence to justify stripping Russia and Qatar of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

However, Garcia said his report “identified serious and wide-ranging issues with the bidding and selection process” which were not in the report.

Garcia said: “A brief I filed with the Fifa appeal committee on November 24 outlined the Eckert decision’s most serious failings.

“The brief explained why no principled approach could justify the Eckert decision’s edits, omissions, and additions.” The appeals committee ruled Garcia’s complaint inadmissible because Eckert’s summary did not represent a final verdict on the corruption inquiry, which has resulted in a number of disciplinary cases.

Garcia accused officials of overlooking Eckert’s statement that “the evaluation of the 2018-22 Fifa World Cups bidding process is closed for the Fifa ethics committee” and Blatter’s assertion that “there is no change to Judge Eckert’s statement” and that the investigation into the bidding process was concluded.

“I am surprised by Garcia’s decision,” Blatter said, irritated, when asked why the report was being suppressed. “The work of the ethics committee will continue and will be a central part of the discussions at the exco meeting.”

Uefa president Michel Platini, who in the past has called for Blatter to stand down, said: “Fifa’s ethics committee was created to increase transparency at the organisation.

“But it has just caused more confusion. Garcia’s resignation is a new failure for Fifa.”

Fifa vice-president Jim Boyce, Britain’s most senior football official, said: “I’m totally shocked. I have said on many occasions the ethics committee was the most important committee formed by Fifa following its reform process.”

Prince Ali Bin al-Hussein, who has been tipped to challenge Blatter for the Fifa presidency, said seeing Garcia go was a shame.

The women who blew the whistle on corruption around the 2010 vote were scathing.

Bonita Mersiades, who worked for Australia’s 2022 bid team, said: “I welcome Mike Garcia’s resignation . . . [and] that [he] agrees with what many of us have long stated – that Fifa is incapable of reform or cultural change.”

Phaedra al-Majid, who was part of Qatar’s successful bid, said: “Garcia’s resignation and his stated reasons are one more, emphatic exposure of Fifa’s self-protecting corruption. Fifa has no ethics.” – The Daily Telegraph