The Fifa president, Gianni Infantino, has agreed to commission an independent governance review after coming under mounting pressure to do so in the wake of the World Cup sale debacle. The Guardian revealed last month that several members of the Fifa council had been lobbying for an external review of both the proposed Fifa Forward Enterprise sell-off and the Folarin Balogun controversy – with the Football Association chair, Debbie Hewitt, increasing the pressure last week by writing to Infantino demanding the release of all documents relating to both issues. Infantino opted not to engage with the disgruntled members of the council, but in a letter sent to all 211 of Fifa’s member associations he has indicated his willingness to submit to external scrutiny for the first time.
In addition, Infantino also invited proposals to review Fifa’s internal decision-making processes, which he said would be discussed at the next Fifa council meeting in Zurich on 15 October. In his letter to the member associations, Infantino does not commit to reviewing FFE and Balogun specifically, however, so has stopped short of bowing to Hewitt’s demands. Infantino is also under pressure to release money from Fifa’s $6bn (£4.5bn) cash reserves to its members, with the presidents of Uefa, and north and central American confederation Concacaf, Aleksander Ceferin and Victor Montagliani last week making a formal request for a payout of at least $10m for each national association.
The Asian Football Confederation president, Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al Khalifa, sent a similar letter on Monday with the issue of funding also to be on the agenda at the Fifa Council meeting next month.
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