17 September – FA president Debbie Hewitt, FIFA vice-president, has added her voice to FIFA president Gianni Infantino’s calls for more transparency regarding the planned sale of FIFA’s commercial rights to a new private equity-backed business, FIFA Football Enterprise (FFE).
Hewitt has written to FIFA president Gianni Infantino to ask FIFA to release the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) documents ahead of the world federation’s next Council meeting.
FIFA Council member and FIFA vice-president Hewitt has written to Gianni Infantino, The Times reported, asking FIFA to release all documents related to plans to sell the World Cup and the Folarin Balogun case.
He also stressed that FIFA cannot conduct its own review of what happened, and called for an independent investigation by the Council.
FIFA has previously said it will present a review of the abandoned plans at the next council meeting following criticism from Danish football chief Jesper Moller. “The FIFA Standing Committees advise and assist the FIFA Council in their respective areas in accordance with the FIFA Statutes and Governing Regulations,” FIFA said in a statement.
“As previously communicated, a review of the withdrawn FIFA Forward Enterprise proposal will be presented to the FIFA Council.”
For the federations and members of the FIFA Council a review by FIFA of its own plans and those of its president is not enough transparency and few trust that it will give all the information or be more than a cover-up.
Infantino has refused to call an emergency meeting of the FIFA Council or answer multiple questions since the scandal broke in early September after The Times newspaper reported on his FFE plans.
Last week, Moller questioned the lack of answers FIFA had provided over the failed plan to sell a minority stake in the World Cup to private equity, sparking an unprecedented governance crisis in the world game. Moller’s comments came after questions asked at a meeting of FIFA’s legal committee were closed by FIFA, sparking anger among the committee’s legal representatives.
European confederation UEFA has led the charge against him, with support from AFC and CONCACAF.
UEFA has filed discovery documents in three US courts targeting FIFA in Miami and Joshua Kushner’s Thrive Capital in New York, which were lined up to take the initial $4.2 billion investment in FFE and are linked to US President Donald Trump. Joshua Kushner is the brother of Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
All have been lawyered up by some of the fiercest American legal representatives money can buy.
UEFA requests the disclosure of all documentation and communications related to the FFE’s proposal.
UEFA experts say that if there is nothing to hide, then why are they trying to hide the information. FIFA and Infantino continue to refuse to take responsibility for their members.
The English FA withdrew its previous support for Infantino’s re-election, which was done before the Balogun scandal, which raised huge concerns around the world about the competitive integrity of the 2026 World Cup.
Great Britain is the sole bidder for the 2035 Women’s World Cup and the decision is expected to be made at a FIFA congress on November 23. It is the first time England has entered FIFA’s bidding process since the 2018 and 2022 World Cup awarding scandals in 2011. England bid for 2018 but did not bid again for FIFA’s regime change.
Next year, FIFA will hold presidential elections at its annual congress in Rabat, Morocco. Infantino came to power in 2015 in the wake of the FIFAGate scandal. However, FIFA’s statutes impose term limits: a FIFA president cannot remain in power for more than 12 years.
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