Unfriendly fire inside Fifa
Two senior Fifa officials, Marco Villiger and Tomaz Vesel, filed the false complaint against secretary general Fatma Samoura, a complaint that was dismissed by the ethics committee. The consequences could be severe, as FIFA’s code of ethics clearly states that filing false accusations is a serious violation.
Two senior Fifa officials, Marco Villiger and Tomaz Vesel, filed the false complaint against secretary general Fatma Samoura, a complaint that was dismissed by the ethics committee. The consequences could be severe, as FIFA’s code of ethics clearly states that filing false accusations is a serious violation.
By Pål Ødegård and Håvard Melnæs
The past week was crazy even by FIFA standards. Last Wednesday BBC revealed that FIFA’s ethics committee had received a complaint against secretary general Fatma Samoura from members of the 2026 World Cup bid evaluation task force. Samoura, who’s full name is Fatma Samba Diouf Samoura, was family related to fellow Senegalese El Hadji Diouf, the claim said. El Hadji Diouf, the former Liverpool forward and Senegal international, is now an ambassador for Morocco’s bid to host the 2026 World Cup. If such a relation was true, it would be a violation of the ethics code for Samoura not to disclose this fact, since it creates a possible conflict of interest.
However, there is no family relation between the two. Not only is Diouf a very common surname in Senegal. El Hadji Diouf was not even baptized Diouf, but as Diallo after his father Boubacar Diallo, also a famous former Senegalese footballer. Both publicly dismissed any family relations as ‘ridiculous’. And on Friday, the ethics committee issued a statement that Samoura would not be investigated, as the claims against her had ‘no substance’. But who filed the complaint? According our sources it was Marco Villiger, deputy secretary general of Fifa, and Tomaz Vesel, chairman of the independent audit & compliance committee.
Boomerang effect?
Now, why would two such high ranking FIFA officials file such a flimsy accusation? As BBC stated in their article when the story broke, FIFA president Gianni Infantino instructed the task force members to find something that could hurt the Moroccan bid. It is widely believed that Infantino prefers that the United bid of Canada, Mexico and the US.
Why they chose such an unfounded pretext, and why the secretary general’s removal by an ethics inquiry would hurt Morocco’s chances aren’t clear. An it is certainly not clear why high ranking FIFA officials would make such a reckless accusation against their “own” secretary general. According to experts in FIFA’s code of ethics Josimar have talked to, Vesel and Villiger should now find themselves in big trouble by the same code, where article 61.3 clearly states that:
“Any person who lodges a complaint against a person who he knows to be innocent, with the intent of harming this person, or in any other way takes malicious steps with the intent of harming this person who he knows to be innocent shall be sanctioned”.
The legal experts Josimar have talked to agree that if circumstances are as they appear, filing an accusation that is clearly not true, and so easy to fact-check, can be regarded as subject to this article. And considering their high-ranking positions and special roles on the inspection task force, a sanction against them ought to be quite severe; both Villiger and Vesel could be banned from football. And if the FIFA president turns out to be involved in a conspiracy against his own secretary general, that applies to him as well.
