The question most football fans ask is who will replace Batter as the next FIFA president after the release of the Presidential candidates’ names.
The Ad hoc FIFA Electoral committee this morning have finally released the list of five candidates for the FIFA Presidential election slated for February 26, 2016 to replace suspended president Sepp Blatter.
Blatter who was accused of making a “disloyal payment” of 2 million Swiss francs ($1.99 million) to Michel Platini, who is currently suspended from his role as head of European soccer, in 2011, and cutting a television rights deal that was detrimental to FIFA.
Unfortunately, no African made the list. Musa Hassan Bility, the head of the Liberian football
association, was on the list before. However, he was disqualified after failing an integrity check, which all the candidates were subjected to.
It is unclear what part of the check Bility failed.
FIFA describes how the check is conducted: This two-step process involved first creating detailed reports of risk-relevant information
relating to each candidate. The integrity check included a review of corporate records, litigation
cases, bankruptcy proceedings, potential regulatory actions taken against the candidate and a review of media reports concerning potential red flags (fraudulent behaviour, match manipulation, human rights violations, etc.). Each candidate was then asked to comment on the content of the detailed report produced.
The final integrity check reports and the comments submitted by the candidates were provided to the members of the Ad-hoc electoral committee and evaluated to determine whether each of the candidates fulfilled the requirements for the presidency as outlined in the FIFA Statutes and Regulations. The decisions of the Ad-hoc Electoral Committee on the eligibility of candidates may be appealed at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in Lausanne. ”
“”The committee will continue to supervise the electoral process to ensure that each candidate complies with all applicable FIFA regulations and provisions leading up to and during the Extraordinary FIFA Congress in February.”
Finally, The candidates admitted and declared are:
• HRH Prince Ali Al Hussein
• Sheikh Salman Bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa
• Jérôme Champagne
• Gianni Infantino
• Tokyo Sexwale
The election will take place at the Extraordinary FIFA Congress in Zurich on 26 February 2016.
