Topic > Do it The secret world of FIFA Essay - 646

In May 2006 the book by British investigative journalist Andrew Jennings Foul! The Secret World of FIFA: Bribes, Vote-Rigging and Ticket Scandals (Harper Collins) has stirred controversy in the soccer world by detailing an alleged international cash-for-contracts scandal following the collapse of FIFA's marketing partner, ISL , and revealed how some football officials were encouraged to secretly pay back the sweeteners they received. The book also claimed that election fraud had occurred in SeppBlatter's fight for continued control of FIFA. After the release of Foul! The BBC television exposé by Jennings and BBC producer Roger Corke for the BBC news program Panorama was broadcast. In this one-hour programme, screened on 11 June 2006, Jennings and the Panorama team agree that SeppBlatter was under investigation by Swiss police for his role in a secret deal to repay more than £1 million in bribes taken by football officials. All testimonials and contents offered in the Panorama exposé were provided through a disguised voice or appearance, or both, except one; Mel Brennan, former professor at Towson University in the United States (and from 2001 to 2003 Head of CONCACAF Special Projects, liaison with the e-FIFA project and delegate of the 2002 FIFA World Cup), became the first top-level footballer insider to make public substantial allegations of greed, corruption, failure to act and wrongdoing by CONCACAF and FIFA leadership. While speaking at Panorama, Brennan, the highest-ranking African American in the history of world football governance, joined Jennings, Trinidadian journalist LisanaLiburd and many others in calling out alleged inappropriate money allocations to CONCACAF and traced links between CONCACAF's alleged criminality and similar behavior... middle of paper... accused officials did not respond to questions about his latest allegations, either verbally or by letter. British Prime Minister David Cameron and Andy Anson, head of England's World Cup bid, criticized the timing of the broadcast, three days before FIFA's decision on the host of the 2018 FIFA World Cup, on the grounds that it could damage England's candidacy; among the voters were officials indicted by the program [35]. In June 2011, the IOC opened an investigation against honorary FIFA president Joao Havelange over corruption allegations. The BBC Panorama program claimed the Brazilian accepted a $1 million "cap" in 1997 from International Sports Leisure (ISL). The Olympic governing body said that “the IOC takes all allegations of corruption very seriously and we will always ask that any evidence of misconduct involving any IOC member be forwarded to our ethics commission".