Uefa says Infantino's Fifa has broken trust over scrapped investment plan
Uefa, the governing body of European football, has announced that it has lost confidence in the leadership of Gianni Infantino at Fifa, the world football body. The statement came as the fallout from a controversial investment plan, which was scrapped over the weekend, continued to intensify.
The plan in question involved selling stakes in Fifa's competitions to private investors. Infantino had proposed to raise funds by selling up to 25 per cent of a new entity that would control the commercial rights to Fifa's tournaments, including the Club World Cup. The proposal drew strong opposition from several football confederations, who feared it would compromise the integrity of the sport and concentrate too much power in private hands.
On Saturday, Infantino announced that Fifa would no longer proceed with the proposal. That announcement came after Uefa had voted to boycott World Cups if the plan went ahead, and other governing bodies, including those from Africa and South America, also voiced their opposition. Senior figures close to Infantino reportedly spoke against the plan earlier in the week.
In a lengthy statement issued on the same day, Uefa welcomed the decision to withdraw the plan, describing it as a victory for the whole game. However, it also used the opportunity to accuse Infantino of breaking promises he made when he was campaigning for the Fifa presidency in 2016. The statement quoted Infantino's speech at the time, in which he said: 'Of course we have to be transparent. The money of Fifa is your money. It's not the money of the Fifa president. You are the national associations and the money of Fifa has to serve for the development of football and not for anything else.'
Uefa said that on both these promises – transparency and the use of money for football development – Infantino had failed. The statement described the investment plan as a 'shabby, back room, opaque deal' that was anything but transparent.
'The current Fifa leadership has not only lost Uefa's confidence but also that of many other members of the football family,' the statement read. It further said that while the proposal had been withdrawn, the task of rebuilding trust in Fifa had only just begun.
This is not the first time the relationship between Uefa and Fifa has come under strain. The two bodies have clashed on several issues in recent years, including the planned expansion of the Club World Cup and the creation of a new World League proposal, which was abandoned in 2020 after similar opposition.
Fifa has not yet responded to Uefa's latest statement. Infantino, who has led Fifa since 2016, was re-elected unopposed in 2023. His tenure has been marked by both commercial expansion and controversies over governance and corruption allegations, though he has denied any wrongdoing.
The scrapping of the investment plan is seen by many observers as a significant victory for those who advocate for a more transparent and democratic governance structure in world football. However, as Uefa noted, the deeper issue of trust in Fifa's leadership remains unresolved.
