Zurich, February 26 (AGENCIES): Gianni Infantino has been elected as the new president of FIFA, having been voted in to replace the disgraced Sepp Blatter at Friday’s election in Zurich.
The UEFA General Secretary beat Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein of Jordan and the former FIFA Deputy General Secretary Jérôme Champagne. South African Tokyo Sexwale withdrew moments before the first vote.
Sheikh Salman had been favourite to succeed Blatter because of support from the Asia and Africa, while Infantino had the backing of Uefa members.
Voting went to a second round after none of the candidates received the required two-thirds majority in the first round at the extraordinary congress. Infantino led the first round, with 88 of the 207 votes cast, ahead of Sheikh Salman’s 85 votes, Prince Ali’s 27 and Champagne’s seven.
It was the first time voting for the Fifa presidential election had reached a second round since 1974, when João Havelange of Brazil became the first non-European president ahead of England’s Sir Stanley Rous. A two-thirds majority (138 votes) was required to win in the first round, but a simple majority of more than 50% (104 votes) was sufficient for victory in the second round.
Infantino secured 115 votes to Sheikh Salman’s 88 to become the second successive Swiss president, after Blatter.
The 45-year-old lawyer is from Brig in the Valais region of Switzerland, less than six miles from Blatter’s hometown of Visp.
Infantino goes from stop-gap to football's most powerful man
ZURICH, February 26 (Reuters): Six months ago Gianni Infantino was a low-profile right-hand man to European soccer boss Michel Platini. He was the striking, shaven-headed character who pulled balls out of glass pots during televised UEFA competition draws.
Barely-known by the general public, he was also the man behind a complex attempt to force Europe's clubs to reign in their spending, but which ended up leaving fans and even club directors confused. On Friday, Infantino was chosen as the new president of FIFA, a position which made his predecessor Sepp Blatter as instantly recognizable as some of the world's leading statesman.
It was a remarkable leap for the affable Swiss-Italian.
The polyglot lawyer only entered the FIFA race in late October, one day before the deadline, as a stop-gap candidate after Platini had been placed under investigation for ethics violations.
When Platini failed to clear his name and was banned from soccer for six years, Infantino was left carrying the hopes of European soccer.
In the intervening time, he has visited several dozen countries, clocking up by his own calculations enough air miles to have flown around the world three times.
"In October 27, I started my journey in Cairo, and last Monday I finished in Cape Town, so it was a kind of Cape to Cairo in reverse," he said during his presentation to the FIFA congress on Friday.
"It was destiny which brought me to start the journey, an exciting journey, a fantastic journey," he said. "Five month ago I was not thinking of being a candidate but many things have happened."
CHANGING FORTUNES
At the same time he was delivering his speech in Zurich, almost three hours' drive away in Nyon the vote was being held for the Europa League, Europe's second tier competition. Had the dice fallen differently, Infantino would have been conducting that draw.
Having joined UEFA in 2000, Infantino rose to become its general secretary in 2009, just as Platini announced his break-even rule known as Financial Fair Play.
Designed to stop rich owners buying success by ploughing unlimited amounts of cash into their clubs, the rule banned clubs from spending more than their generated revenue.
Infantino has said it saved European clubs from spending themselves into oblivion but critics argued it prevented smaller clubs from growing and cemented a status quo in which the same teams dominate.
There was also confusion over the way it was implemented. UEFA initially said that clubs who did not comply would be kicked out of European competition, no matter how big.
In the event, clubs were allowed to negotiate settlements and, while some were subjected to financial penalties and squad reductions, no big clubs were expelled from European competition.
"Financial Fair Play is a very important tool and the only thing (problem) is that it's not all that easy sometimes to understand how the system works, and maybe UEFA has to do it more transparently," said Bayern Munich chief executive Karl-Heinz Rummenigge.
Infantino's watch has also seen the European championship expanded from 16 to 24 teams while the innovative move of staging the 2020 tournament in 13 cities around Europe rather than a single host nation.
Although Infantino's election is hoped to mark a clean break with FIFA's past, his rise to the top bears some similarities to that of his disgraced predecessor Blatter, who has been banned for six years for ethics violations.
Both were raised in the same Swiss valley, only 10 km (six miles) from each other, both were modest amateur footballers and both speak the same five languages. Each went to university and then began their careers in the French-speaking part of Switzerland.
During the campaign, Infantino often had to fend off suggestions that he is too Eurocentric. "I'm not the European candidate, I'm not the UEFA candidate," he responded at one point. "I'm a football person, so I feel that I am the candidate for football."
FIFA approves major reforms to curb corruption
Zurich, February 26 (AFP): FIFA approved major reforms at a congress on Friday, part of world football's effort to end the culture of corruption that has plagued its governing body for years.
The measures were adopted by 179 members, while 22 voted against and six abstained at a congress in Zurich that will also elect a replacement to FIFA's disgraced president Sepp Blatter.
The reforms were developed since June by a committee led by Francois Carrard, a Swiss lawyer tasked with a similar cleanup effort at the International Olympic Committee more than a decade ago.
Among the most crucial measures are changes in the role of FIFA's president and its executive committee.
The president's job has been altered to function like a corporate chairman of the board, providing strategic guidance but with less management authority.
FIFA's executive committee, which had become an epicentre of graft, has been re-branded as a FIFA council, and will operate similar to a corporate board of directions. FIFA's secretary general, previously number two to the president, will serve as world football's CEO.
Those measures were designed to contain the authority of FIFA's top brass in a bid to prevent a repeat of the patronage and waste that prevailed during Blatter's 18-year term as president.
The president and council members will also be limited to three consecutive four-year terms. Several measures to improve financial transparency at the multi-billion dollar organisation were also approved. Revenues will be published, as will compensation for senior officials, while auditing will be more independent and more robust.
The number of commissions, seen as bloated and wasteful in the past, has been cut from 26 to 9.
There was also a mandate to expand the role of women in global football governance, with at least one woman required on the council of each national federation.
Broadly, the reforms include measures to promote "culture change" at FIFA, as well as more ethical and accountable leadership. There were calls to end political interference and conflicts of interest in executive decision making, two factors that most agree led FIFA into crisis. Before the vote, a Palestinian representative addressed the congress to lobby against approving the reforms, arguing that a period of crisis was the wrong time to push through a major restructuring.
