The investigation into the bidding for the 2018 and 2022 soccer World Cups found no significant evidence of corruption and dismissed the notion of a revote on the host nations, clearing Russia to stage the 2018 tournament and Qatar to do so in 2022.
The conclusions were included in a summary of the investigation released on Thursday by FIFA’s head ethics judge, who noted “potentially problematic conduct” by several of the bidding nations but largely dismissed broader questions about corruption in the voting process. Those conclusions were immediately contested by the investigator who collected the evidence.
The judge, Hans-Joachim Eckert, a German who heads the adjudicatory arm of FIFA’s ethics committee, released his 42-page summary after reviewing the work of Michael J. Garcia, a former United States attorney and the head of the investigatory chamber of the committee.
But soon after Eckert released his report, Garcia harshly criticized his decision, saying in a statement that the adjudicatory chamber’s report contained “numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions detailed in the investigatory chamber’s report.”
Eckert’s statement focused primarily on the actions — and violations — of the various bidders, but the strongest criticism in Garcia’s report was directed at FIFA’s executive committee, according to a person briefed on its contents. Garcia’s investigations uncovered ethics violations by a number of executive committee members, the person said, noting that many would most likely face charges brought by the ethics committee.
“It is not just the usual suspects” who will be charged, the person added.
Garcia said he would appeal Eckert’s decision, a public break in the ethics committee that abruptly called into question any of its conclusions in the bidding investigation.
In his statement on Garcia’s report, which is said to be nearly 500 pages, Eckert wrote that while Garcia found potential ethics violations by Qatar and Russia, the discoveries were “far from reaching any threshold that would require returning to the bidding process, let alone reopening it.” According to Eckert, the investigation also did not find any evidence of wrongdoing by Sepp Blatter, the longtime president of FIFA.
In fact, the heaviest criticism from Eckert with regard to ethical violations during the bidding process was directed at a losing bid: In its attempt to stage the 2018 tournament, England engaged in actions that were “damaging” to FIFA’s image and the bidding process, Eckert wrote. In particular, Eckert highlighted Garcia’s discovery that officials handling England’s bid had numerous interactions with Jack Warner, a member of FIFA’s executive committee who was later removed amid allegations of improper conduct.
Qatar, which has been at the center of much speculation about misconduct, was found to have committed some violations – particularly with regard to its use of consultants – but Eckert wrote that the country’s actions, “were, all in all, not suited to compromise the integrity” of the bid process as a whole. Eckert made a similar statement about Russia’s bid for the 2018 event, despite noting that Russia made only a limited number of documents available to the investigators because the computers used by Russian officials who handled the bid had been destroyed.
FIFA moved quickly to embrace Eckert’s findings, releasing a statement that said it “welcomes the fact that a degree of closure has been reached” in the affair.
Qatar’s Supreme Committee for Delivery and Legacy, the body responsible for the 2022 World Cup, said in a statement on Thursday that it continued “to believe that a fair and appropriate review will demonstrate the integrity and quality of our bid.” The Russian sports minister, Vitaly Mutko, told Reuters, “It’s good to put a line under this, and I hope we will not have talk about this again.”
English officials responded angrily on Thursday, with the Football Association declaring in a statement: “We do not accept any criticism regarding the integrity of England’s bid or any of the individuals involved.”
In total, Eckert commented on eight of the nine groups that submitted bids (a joint proposal by Spain and Portugal was omitted and the countries appeared to be particularly uncooperative). The United States, which applied to host the 2022 tournament, was not found to have committed any significant wrongdoing.
Eckert indicated in his report that Garcia should bring charges against individuals who violated FIFA’s ethics code but closed the investigation of the bidding process as a whole. FIFA’s statement said it welcomed the opportunity to continue planning for the two tournaments, though it remained unclear when the Qatar tournament will be played.
Holding the tournament in the summer, when the event normally takes place, is now seen as unfeasible in Qatar, meaning that a winter tournament — perhaps as late as November and December of 2022 — is a possibility.
In the end, Eckert’s report identified few individuals and recommended only minor changes to FIFA’s rules and procedures, an outcome that may increase calls for the organization to release Garcia’s full report. While Garcia and other soccer officials have called for Garcia’s report to be made public (with appropriate redactions), Eckert has said that confidentiality issues preclude that from happening. In his summary, Eckert reiterated that publication of the full investigative report was “impossible.”
Despite Eckert’s official closing of the investigation into the bidding, concerns about the validity of the vote will most likely linger. The voting in 2010 to decide which countries would host the 2018 and 2022 tournaments was widely seen as strange from the beginning. Simultaneous voting on two World Cup hosts was unprecedented, and many thought it invited vote-trading. A report about a cash-for-votes plot also appeared in the British newspaper The Sunday Times before the voting was even conducted, leading to the suspension of two members of FIFA’s executive committee before the vote.
In considering the 2018 host, the 22-member committee went through two rounds of balloting before Russia received the 12 votes necessary to win. England; the joint bid from Spain and Portugal; and a dual application by the Netherlands and Belgium were among those considered.
When it came to the 2022 tournament, four rounds of voting were required before Qatar received 14 votes, edging out the United States, which received eight votes. Australia, Japan and South Korea were eliminated in earlier rounds.
Both selections were notable — Russia will be the first country in Eastern Europe to host the event, and Qatar will be the first nation in the Middle East to do so — and the surprising results quickly led to questions about the bidding and voting.
News reports about impropriety began to trickle out almost immediately, and it quickly became difficult to keep track of just who was accusing whom of what. Two members of the selection committee, Jack Warner of Trinidad and Tobago and Mohamed bin Hammam of Qatar, were later removed amid allegations of unethical behavior, including payments from Bin Hammam to Warner and others.
Another member of the executive committee, the American Chuck Blazer, reported Bin Hammam and Warner to FIFA’s ethics committee. Two years after emerging as a whistle-blower, however, Blazer was suspended by FIFA for “various breaches of the code of ethics.”
Eckert, in his summary, indicated that the investigation into Bin Hammam found that while Bin Hammam supported the Qatari application, his actions were intended to push a personal agenda and did not directly affect the bid.
In all, at least six of the 22 people who voted on the 2018 and 2022 host countries have been connected to serious allegations of impropriety. In the years since, FIFA has changed the voting process to involve all 209 member nations, as opposed to only the executive committee.
Garcia, who gained notoriety for prosecuting the former governor of New York, Eliot Spitzer, spent millions of dollars in his investigation of FIFA, gathering evidence and conducting interviews across the world. He did not have subpoena powers and at times encountered resistance from FIFA officials, who for years have been plagued by allegations of corruption. Three members of the executive committee declined to participate in his investigation, the report said, and two others could not be contacted.
As recently as June, Franz Beckenbauer, a former star player for Germany and a member of the executive committee, was suspended by FIFA’s ethics committee after refusing to answer questions from Garcia. Beckenbauer subsequently agreed to respond.