This was reported after global dissatisfaction led FIFA to withdraw its plan to allow private investments in the World Cup.
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“The current FIFA leadership has lost the trust not only of UEFA but also of many other members of the football family,” the statement said.
The organization overseeing world football, FIFA, presented this plan this week. It was claimed that the plan could attract up to 4.2 billion USD in private investments if the proposed subsidiary commercial company “FIFA Forward Enterprise” (FFE) were valued at 20 billion USD.
If the project were approved, each of the 211 FIFA member associations could receive a one-time payment of 20 million USD at the beginning of 2027, and their funding allocations for the 2027–2030 cycle would increase from 8 million to 20 million USD.
According to the proposal, private investors could acquire company shares but would remain minority shareholders.
However, G. Infantino announced that after a strong reaction from football officials worldwide, he abandoned the plan to allow private investments in the World Cup.
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“Our goal has always been and will be to unite and improve,” G. Infantino said in the statement. “Therefore, this proposal will not be implemented.”
Earlier this week, the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) stated that none of its national teams would participate in any FIFA tournaments “while these proposals are alive.”
The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and the Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) also condemned this move.
UEFA’s statement said that the 56-year-old Swiss broke promises made to be elected in 2016, specifically to be “transparent” and that FIFA’s money is “your (member associations’) money, not the FIFA president’s money.”
“He did not fulfill either of these promises,” UEFA said.
“The disgraceful, secret, non-transparent agreement he made and tried to implement was not transparent at all. And having more than 5 billion dollars in reserves, he also did not use the associations’ money for the game,” the statement added.
