Last week, on November 8, the story broke that former FIFA president, Sepp Blatter, publicly revealed his stance on the decision to award Qatar the hosting rights for the 2022 World Cup. The 86-year-old football administrator categorically claimed that it was “a mistake” to have settled for Qatar in what is, perhaps, the most high-profile contention against the hosting of the international football fiesta to have hit the media.
In truth, there are not many in Blatter’s shoes who can comment on the facts. The Swiss was in charge of FIFA in 2010 when its Executive Committee contentiously decided to hold the World Cup in Qatar in 2022 after the edition hosted by Russia in 2018.
Blatter revealed that not only did he not vote for Qatar, but that he had planned what he described as a “gesture of peace” for football to be a symbol of fraternity between two conflicting world powers Russia and the United States, so that having two subsequent competitions held, first in Russia and subsequently in the USA, would soften their bickering and help both countries to mend fences, with improvements in relations between Moscow and Washington.
The aging octogenarian, who had intentionally avoided media attention since being cleared of fraud charges in July, felt compelled to speak up, following the negative jabs thrown at the host country over alleged human rights abuses, among other issues.
In an interview with Swiss newspaper, Tages-Anzeiger, Blatter opened up with no uncertain terms and in point-blank directness. He said: “The choice of Qatar was a mistake. At the time, we actually agreed in the executive committee that Russia should get the 2018 World Cup and the USA that of 2022. It would have been a gesture of peace if the two long-standing political opponents had hosted the World Cup one after the other. It’s too small a country. Football and the World Cup are too big for that.
“I can only repeat: the award to Qatar was a mistake and I was responsible for that as president at the time. Now that the World Cup is imminent, I’m glad that, with a few exceptions, no footballers are boycotting the World Cup. For me it is clear: Qatar is a mistake. The choice was bad.”
Aside the fact of Qatar being a small country for a global fiesta like the World Cup, there were other disadvantages that ought to have left Qatar out of the running for hosting rights. As a country in the Arab region with very strong conservative Muslim customs and traditions, on the one hand, and the extreme, sweltering weather conditions common to the region, it was a challenging environment to host football matches without regular breaks. These were facts that made it seem impossible for that country to get a winning bid through, but that was exactly what it accomplished 12 years ago at the bidding process for the 2022 World Cup. It went against logic how it beat countries that had stakes in football, that had organised international football competitions and influence within the game, such as the United States, South Korea, Japan and Australia.
Yet, the most remarkable aspect about Qatar’s win was how convincing it was. After the first round of voting, Qatar already had more supporters than three of its four competitors put together and this support increased with the elimination of Australia, Japan, and South Korea. In the end, it was just the United States left and Qatar ultimately defeated the weight of America with an outstanding 14-8 votes in its favour.
In the aftermath of the winning bid, the amazement of the results soon turned to suspicion. It was not long before a barrage of claims of bribery and general corruption overshadowed Qatar’s winning bid. But, the bid was held after it was determined that the Qatari proposal followed due bidding process. It did not stop tongues from wagging about how much Qatar’s financial heft must have played in making this incredible bid successful.
Blatter admitted that he had cast his ballot in favour of the United States and that Michel Platini, the former president of UEFA, had played a role in Qatar’s victory by siding with the Gulf state.
The two football administrators have been tainted by accusations of corrupt practices in the governance of the sports bodies they oversaw and there are often more to these accusations than meets the eye yet, the evidence of Qatar influencing their actions was never obtained.
Indeed, in 2015, Blatter resigned from his position as FIFA president after claims that he had authorised a €1.6 million illicit payment to Platini, the president of UEFA at the time. FIFA initially imposed an eight-year ban on Blatter, which was later reduced to six years. However, in March 2021, he received a new ban for “various violations” of the organisation’s Code of Ethics, which will keep him out of football until 2028.
In July this year, a Swiss court exonerated Blatter and Platini of all corruption-related accusations.
As at the time the hosting rights went to Qatar, the country had only three stadia and not much in terms of the infrastructure necessary to successfully host an expansive competition like the World Cup. There was also that bothersome disadvantage of summer temperatures that could go up to 50 degrees Celsius. This heat issue was particularly worth pointing out because Qatar’s desert temperatures exceeded levels allowed for both fans and footballers. FIFA rules explicitly state that play cannot be allowed in more than 32 degrees Celsius (89.6 degrees Fahrenheit) without mandatory cooling breaks.
To sidestep this hurdle, Qatar promised to build solar-powered aircooling stadiums – something that environmentalists consistently oppose – and pour money into providing every necessary infrastructure to make the hosting of the competition possible. There were plans for a metro system of transportation, a new airport and a substantial number of hotels to accommodate the near two million expected to enter the Gulf peninsula state, with a native population of just over a million.
As dedicated as Qatar was to these promises, with the financial heft to make it happen, neither FIFA nor the government fully considered the labour that would go into bringing this dream to life from the perspective of the workers involved.
What came to light, as Qatar put its enormous resources to work to bring about desired results, was an unfortunate story of the degradation of the human person.
The conditions for the millions of migrant workers needed to build the massive infrastructure and stadia for the World Cup under the most extreme heat and despoiled state saw low-paid migrants from Asia and Africa become an exploited workforce. They were the significant human resources employed for the considerable number of infrastructure projects to get Qatar ready for the hosting of the sporting event and no labour rights commitment was requested by FIFA from Qatar, even with the existence of human rights reports detailing abuses against migrant workers there.
In a 2016 report titled, ‘Qatar World Cup of Shame,’ Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch drew attention to the mistreatment of workers building stadiums. A subsequent study by The Guardian in 2021 revealed that between 2010 and 2020, at least 6,751 migrant workers—mostly from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka—died in Qatar as they worked to get the country ready for the World Cup.
Qatar’s treatment of these labourers constructing the country’s World Cup infrastructure has come under fire, including allegations of non-payment of wages, crowded living quarters, and forcible evacuation in advance of the competition.
Tens of thousands of employees have suffered from physical or mental health problems as a result of wage theft and other abuses, sacrificed their health working in the intense heat in Qatar or have passed away in avoidable, unexplained and uninvestigated accidents while abusive employers retain unchecked power over employees. Then, there is also the country’s institutionalisation of homophobia to keep in mind as well.
As a result of pressure from groups like Human Rights Watch, Qatar implemented some late reforms, including labour safeguards and the repeal of the kafala system, which forbade immigrant workers from changing jobs without the employer’s express approval.
However, the efficacy of these reforms has been questioned, with the new minimum wage being a little over €1 an hour and scepticism regarding whether the kafala system reforms actually took place. Many of the injured and deceased did not receive these amendments to their working conditions until it was too late for them to benefit.
The majority of these reforms were either weakly enforced or had a limited scope. As a result, many workers who contributed to the construction of the World Cup’s infrastructure did not actually benefit and both the government and FIFA have not yet agreed to set up remedy funds for the grieving families.
In response, the Qatari Government has engaged a formidable public relations effort to deflect criticisms of its human rights record. The government-funded and Qatar-based Al Jazeera news network posted a video on its O2 digital platform in which it claimed that Western criticism of Qatar was motivated by “Qatarphobia,” with the West singling it out because it is an Arab and Muslim nation.
Some of these accusations have come from the Western media categorising Qatar’s efforts to gain soft power through sports and they point to their funding of the beIN Media Group and its increased commercialisation of Qatari sports and the Qatari Sports Investment ownership of French Ligue 1 giants Paris Saint-Germain.
Qatar insists that they have played by the book and made reforms where necessary. But, a study by Amnesty International released in October, titled ‘Unfinished Business: What Qatar Must Do To Fulfil Promises On Migrant Workers’ Rights’, discovered that thousands of workers were still being denied wages or having them delayed, being denied rest days and were being exposed to unsafe working conditions.
Qatar still argues that progress has been made and that the tournament will be a force for good in the country. In a few days, the country will be at the centre of world attention for football’s most prestigious event. For football fans in Nigeria, whose appetites for joy, excitement and exhilaration have been stymied by bad governance, the World Cup often provided an outlet to temporarily suspend sorrows, anguish and “sapa” and celebrate football. But, even that has now become a victim of the mismanagement that has been the country’s bane.
As I have always pointed out in my writings here, everything rises and or falls on the quality of the leadership at play. Years of not fielding our first 11 to run the affairs of state and instead, being led by a cast of mediocres, have contributed to our inability to dominate soccer in Africa and of course, participate in the elite Qatar FIFA World Cup. Africa has five spots at the competition and Nigeria could not make it?
Already, from a rank of 30 in March after failing to qualify for the World Cup, Nigeria has dropped two places to a rank of 32 in October. And the World Cup has not started yet.
Indeed, I am, like many other Nigerians, not particularly excited about this FIFA World Cup the way we would have been if the Super Eagles had qualified. Nigeria needs to truly start developing soccer in the country if we intend to be the dominant soccer nation in Africa. Can you imagine a FIFA World Cup championship without Germany, Brazil or Argentina?
Nigeria needs to wake up. I miss the golden years of Nigerian football.
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