It’s a fair question! In recent days, further to long running
criminal investigations in the United States by Federal authorities such as the
FBI, the Attorney General and the Internal Revenue Service, executive members
of this International Football Association were arrested at a five star Zurich Hotel for sponsoring crooked
international football sponsorship deals with giant multinational corporations,
creaming off sizeable splits for themselves which they laundered through
American banks and other financial institutions. In short the Government of the
United States got the Swiss to arrest these people for crimes committed on
American soil. These were not for allegations made but for Federal criminal
prosecution. Soon after, a congress of this International Football Association
met at a pre-appointed time to elect their President and took the decision to re-elect
the man who’d already been running the organization for 12 years or more, the
Swiss national Sepp Blatter!
After the shock and horror very recent arrests of FIFA executive
members in Zurich where the organization has its head office, the decision to
re-elect its current President came as something of a shock to members of
Europe’s football executive authority UEFA. Why should the man who’d overseen
the running of the organization for so many years and must have known about all
the corruption going on have been chosen once again and with such a huge margin
of votes to keep hold of his job and run such a tarnished organization for the
next four years. And why, furthermore, did the man have such a big grin on his
face and seem so sure of his victory after he stepped up to make his cheery,
quirky acceptance speech? Despite a challenge from an Arab prince from which he
quickly backed down, Uncle Sepp knew he had it in the bag even before the
election was held, never mind that senior members of his own team were falling
like ninepins over corruption charges?
Despite all the feverish conjecture in the European press let’s look
at it coolly. Swiss national Blatter was re-elected because he got most of the
votes from the African, Asian and South American football delegations and
that’s close to a two-thirds majority of all the affiliated football
association members. It was never going to be that much of a problem really.
Blatter the Swiss national was always going to very good at what the Swiss are
famous for and that is the organization of finance. It is little wonder that
FIFA has its international headquarters in politically neutral Switzerland, a country that is neither a member of the
United Nations or the European Community, and furthermore claimed neutrality
during the Second World War and was left untouched by the Nazis only a jackboot
away. Why this was is already well known. Swiss financial institutions at the
time along with Swiss industry, with tacit Government backing, were privately
doing some very nice deals with their Nazi neighbors exchanging gold from the
teeth of dead Jews which went into their banks to help finance loans for
industrial goods. More recently Swiss based banks have been up to their
eyeballs in quietly and very privately acting as tax avoidance havens for
countless international corporations and wealthy individuals.
Switzerland is not simply a country of cuckoo clocks, cheese curdling
and watchmakers. It’s a place that’s spent most of its time claiming political
neutrality so that it can be well out of the way for taking any kind of moral
responsibility for anything and get on with what it does best… collecting money
and being a base of activity for international organizations with large
financial portfolios like FIFA. From Zurich the world center of international
football organizes gigantic sponsorship deals with worldwide multinationals
such as Master Card, sportswear companies like Adidas and food and drink
outfits such as Coca Cola and
MacDonald’s for what are essentially advertising rights. In return for
the deals FIFA uses much of the money it earns to promote football throughout
the world, especially throughout Africa and Asia in recent decades. It has done
this in many positive ways such as supporting national football associations,
building football pitches and creating an enthusiastic and positive environment
for the game. Such ways of spending money, especially in Africa, have earned
the organization much credit and Blatter as President has gained considerable
political support for his efforts and those of his executive team, especially
as much of the money spent has been in some of the poorest areas where the
promotion of football has been particularly welcomed by young people.
The personal credit gained for these football promotional activities
has mainly fallen on the shoulders of FIFA’S organizing President. Is it any
wonder then that he should be re-elected to his role with such a handsome
majority. His political contacts and friendly relations with national heads of
state, especially for organizing World Cup Football presentation for their
countries, naturally filters down through their national football associations
so when it comes to elections the way that votes go is hardly in doubt! On the
other side however there’s all the business of organizing the loot in the first
place. This is something left to his Executive members for discrete regions and
territories each of whom in turn have their own kind of fiefdom and make their
own deals with major national associations for countries like Brazil and
Argentina. For every region and every national association there are always
opportunities for kickbacks from sponsorship rights and just about everyone at
any senior level gets a well hidden handshake from opposite organizing
executives in the giant multinationals.
This all round dirt is one of the major reasons for the American
indictments, especially as most of the kickbacks over the years have passed
through their banks. However it is certainly not the only reason why the
Americans are pissed. Somehow Russia won the right to sponsor The World
Football Cup in 2018 seemingly against all the odds then Qatar went on to win
the sponsorship for 2022. Both awards it seemed were contingent on heavy
backing from the FIFA Executive in return for heavy financial support from both
nations which in turn helped fix the result. If the Americans were badly put
out it was because they’d hoped to gain the World Cup for themselves on one of
the two dates. In consequence their Federal authorities began a lengthy and
complex criminal investigation of FIFA taking in both the procedures of
sponsorship and with the promotion of the World Cup Competition. Hardly coincidental
the result of their investigation and the much publicized arrests in Zurich broke
days before the new election for President and were clearly aimed at the
individual they regarded as the central cause for their failure.
With his carefully organized shift of world football power from
Europe to Africa and Asia over the last ten years, Sepp Blatter was able to
give them two fingers and personally stay clear of any scandal. He must have
known what members of his Executive Council were doing but stayed clear of it
all and left them alone to rake in the loot. He was merely the President. The
figurehead of the international football authority! In the very best tradition
of Switzerland itself he remained neutral, in consequence untouchable and
re-electable.
Yes, neutral Switzerland is certainly one of the great world centers
of scandal and dirt but nearly always in secret of course! Perhaps that’s
because what is morally scandalous to so many others is simply no problem to
them! The Swiss are the world’s great shruggers of shoulders! Why should we
Swiss get involved? It’s not our problem! Perhaps that’s why they allow such an
organization as Dignitas, a business that promotes and carries out assisted
suicide for financial gain to operate there with one of its senior advisors a
struck off psychiatrist booted out of his profession not so long back.
Yes the Swiss will do anything for money. Whether it’s profiting from
the dead or killing the living… helping the rich hide all their loot to being
somewhere you can earn dirty money from sport.
Switzerland! For the rich,
the dead and the dirty! If you want someone to help you die go to merry
Switzerland! They’ll even let you hear a cuckoo clock chirp before they shove a
needle into your eyeball.
Finally, as was so very predictable after his sweet little re-election,
the Swiss midget has immediately dismissed those nasty American indictments hanging
over his mates as fractious and unimportant. Well you would say that wouldn’t you Blatter… Meanwhile it’s back to business
as usual at Thiefa. How very Swiss of you Sepp!
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