While still nearly a decade away, the 2022 World Cup—which is slated to be held in Qatar—is making headlines again amidst new details about the treatment of migrant construction workers who are building facilities and an ethics investigation into FIFA’s selection process for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. The latest concerns are only the most recent in a long line of issues raised since Qatar was awarded the right to host in 2010. It is almost past the point where FIFA, or more importantly its sponsors, can take action to address the many concerns surrounding the world’s most popular sporting event.
Last week, the Guardian released a report detailing what it described as the “state-sponsored slavery” of North Korean workers constructing Lusail City, the ambitious $45 billion development built for the World Cup. The article alleges that the migrant workers have recieved no pay for the three years they work in Qatar; instead, all their wages are sent back to Pyongyang, where the regime pockets up to 90 percent.
This latest report comes on the heels of an earlier investigation, also published by the Guardian, which found that 1,000 workers, mainly from Nepal, India and Bangladesh, had already died in the construction work for the World Cup.
The bid process that chose Qatar to host the event also raises further questions. Allegations of potential bribery by the Qatari Football Association have been well-publicized—former FIFA executive committee member and Qatari politician Mohammed bin Hammam allegedly paid $5 million in fees and favors to other important members in exchange for the votes necessary to secure the World Cup. Bin Hammam subsequently received a lifetime ban from soccer. Jack Warner, former Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) president and FIFA vice president, also received a ban for allegedly accepting bribes to give Qatar the cup.
US attorney and head of the investigative arm of the FIFA ethics committee, Michael Garcia, finished an extensive ethics report last month about corruption allegations surrounding the awarding of both the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. However, Hans-Joachim Eckert, chair of the adjudicatory arm of the ethics committee is withholding the Garcia report from the public over privacy concerns for the individuals it named.
FIFA did however release a summary of the Garcia report, which did not find a “smoking gun” connecting bin Hammam’s payments to the bid process. In Eckert’s brief summary, he acknowledged that “problematic conduct” took place in the bid process, but wrote that the ethics committee will not move to strip the cup from Russia or Qatar.
From the possible ethics violations, to the human rights concerns, to the fact that a summer tournament in the Persian Gulf could be dangerously hot, FIFA has grossly mishandled the entire 2022 World Cup process to date. As Sepp Blatter himself, president of FIFA, said in May, choosing Qatar as host was a mistake.
To rectify that mistake, FIFA first needs to release the full Garcia report. The summary released is a sham that cheapens FIFA’s already suspect integrity. Garcia blasted Eckert’s summary, saying that it contains holes and “erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions.” He has repeatedly called for the full report to be released.
Without the full report, there is no way of determining what actually happened in the bid process. Garcia said his full report detailed ethics violations at the highest levels of FIFA, including the executive committee, whereas the summary released spread blame on all football associations bidding instead of on those within FIFA. By withholding the full report and laying blame elsewhere, FIFA is protecting its own and maintaining, like it always does, that it did nothing wrong.
Beyond the corruption report, FIFA also needs to address concerns regarding treatment of workers in Qatar constructing World Cup stadiums and facilities. For an international organization like FIFA, which made $2 billion on the 2014 World Cup and will certainly make even more in 2018 and 2022, the massive death toll in preparation for these tournaments is unacceptable.
FIFA needs to work more closely with the Qatari government, NGOs like Human Rights Watch and the Supreme Committee of Delivery and Legacy—the Qatari organization responsible for completing preparations—to ensure that constructing World Cup facilities is done without human rights violations.
If FIFA fails to act on these concerns, it becomes the sponsors’ responsibility to act. Five of FIFA’s six main sponsors—Visa, Coca-Cola, Adidas, Sony, and Hyundai/Kia—have expressed concerns about the bribery allegations, but these and other sponsors need to go further and withhold financial support if workers rights and corruption concerns are not addressed.
The significant cloud of concern over the 2022 World Cup only continues to grow. FIFA has mishandled just about everything possible with regard to the tournament, and now the onus falls on them to correct the mistakes and not make future ones. If FIFA does not address the worker’s safety, ethics, and weather concerns in Qatar, the sponsors should push for a new bidding process, potentially by withholding their financial support to a corrupt organization.