Wednesday, May 27, 2015

FIFA Officials Being Arrested on Corruption

Currently in Zurich, Switzerland, a number of FIFA officials are being arrested and extradited to the US on corruption charges. Sadly though, Sepp Blatter is not one of those. My only question is what took so long? The arrests happened as FIFA officials were attending a meeting at headquarters. Swiss law enforcement, not in uniform, went to hotel rooms to arrest each of them. It goes to show just how corrupt FIFA is that the neutral Swiss are going out of their way to arrest them and send them to the US.

The charges are money laundering, racketeering, and wire fraud. As everyone know, a bribery scandal recently rocked FIFA, with Qatar paying millions of dollars and giving gifts for votes. Its also likely Russia did the same for the 2018 World Cup. One law enforcement official said, "We’re struck by just how long this went on for and how it touched nearly every part of what FIFA did." This article in the New York Times has loads of details.

It's still highly doubtful that the 2022 World Cup will be moved from Qatar, despite the hundreds of deaths of migrant workers. Recently, workers from Nepal were not allowed to go back to check on family or attend funerals, despite the thousands who tragically died in the Nepal Earthquake. Stay classy, Qatar. The 2022 Cup was also moved to November/December because of the extreme heat during the Summer, even though it will interfere with the club soccer calendar.

It is also highly doubtful that Sepp Blatter won't win re-election as head of FIFA. The election is Friday May 30th. Though one can only hope after this investigation that Blatter will have his day in court.

I would personally love to see the Men in Blazers run FIFA, right from their closet in the crap part of SoHo.

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