International soccer’s governing body needs to implement anti-corruption controls for it to operate effectively in the future, said the new head of a governance committee.
Mark Pieth, a professor of criminology at the University of Basel who leads the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s bribery working group, was appointed by Fédération Internationale de Football Association, or FIFA, to lead an independent multi-stakeholder committee to advise on the reorganization of FIFA’s governance. He was introduced Wednesday at a press conference at FIFA’s Zurich headquarters. Corruption Currents watched the live stream on the body’s website.
Referring to FIFA’s massive growth over the years, Pieth compared the body to an international corporation that has grown so fast that its compliance has lagged. But he said there’s more to it than that: FIFA is quite close to states and international organizations.
As such, “you have to upgrade governance to meet the requirements of a large company, of an international organization,” he said.
