Allegations of corruption and bribery related to the 2022 FIFA World Cup

There have been allegations of bribery or corruption in the 2022 FIFA World Cup selection process involving members of the FIFA Executive Committee. There have been numerous allegations of bribery between the Qatar bid committee and FIFA members and executives, some of whom—including Theo Zwanziger and Sepp Blatter—were later recorded regretting awarding Qatar the tournament.

2011

In May 2011, allegations of corruption within the FIFA senior officials raised questions over the legitimacy of the World Cup being held in Qatar. According to then vice-president Jack Warner, an email has been publicised about the possibility that Qatar 'bought' the 2022 World Cup through bribery via Mohammed bin Hammam who was president of the Asian Football Confederation at the time. Qatar's officials in the bid team for 2022 have denied any wrongdoing. A whistleblower, revealed to be Phaedra Almajid, alleged that several African officials were paid $1.5m by Qatar. She later retracted her claims of bribery, stating she had fabricated them in order to exact revenge on the Qatari bid team for relieving her of her job with them. She also denied being put under any pressure to make her retraction. FIFA confirmed receiving an email from her which stated her retraction.

2014–15

See also: Garcia Report and 2015 FIFA corruption case

In March 2014, it was alleged that a firm linked to Qatar's successful campaign paid committee member Jack Warner and his family almost $2 million. The Daily Telegraph reported that it understands that the U.S. FBI is investigating Warner and his alleged links to the Qatari bid.

On 1 June 2014, The Sunday Times claimed to have obtained documents including e-mails, letters and bank transfers which allegedly proved that Bin Hammam had paid more than 5 million US dollars to Football officials to support the Qatar bid. Bin Hamman and all those accused of accepting bribes denied the charges.

Later in June 2014, Qatar Airways CEO Akbar Al Baker gave an interview to German media in June 2014 stating that the allegations are being driven by envy and mistrust by parties who do not want the World Cup staged in Qatar, and that the country is not getting the respect it deserves over its efforts to hold the World Cup. He reiterated that the Qatari Emir strictly punishes and forbids instances of corruption and bribery with a zero-tolerance policy.

In an interview published on 7 June 2015, Domenico Scala, the head of FIFA's Audit And Compliance Committee, stated that "should there be evidence that the awards to Qatar and Russia came only because of bought votes, then the awards could be cancelled".

Qatar faced growing pressure over its hosting of the World Cup in relation to allegations over the role of former top football official Mohammed bin Hammam played in securing the bid. A former employee of the Qatar bid team alleged that several African officials were paid $1.5 million by Qatar. She retracted her claims, but later said that she was coerced to do so by Qatari bid officials. In March 2014, it was discovered that disgraced former CONCACAF president Jack Warner and his family were paid almost $2 million from a firm linked to Qatar's successful campaign. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is investigating Warner and his alleged links to the Qatari bid.

The Sunday Times published bribery allegations based on a leak of millions of secret documents. Five of FIFA's six primary sponsors, Sony, Adidas, Visa, Hyundai, and Coca-Cola, called upon FIFA to investigate the claims. Jim Boyce, vice-president of FIFA, stated he would support a re-vote to find a new host if the corruption allegations are proven. FIFA completed a lengthy investigation into these allegations and a report cleared Qatar of any wrongdoing. Despite the claims, the Qataris insisted that the corruption allegations were being driven by envy and mistrust while Sepp Blatter said it was fueled by racism in the British media.

In the 2015 FIFA corruption case, Swiss officials, operating under information from the United States Department of Justice, arrested many senior FIFA officials in Zürich, Switzerland and seized physical and electronic records from FIFA's main headquarters. The arrests continued in the United States, where several FIFA officers were arrested, and FIFA buildings were raided. The arrests were made on the information of at least a $150 million (USD) corruption and bribery scandal.

On 7 June 2015, Phaedra Almajid, the former media officer for the Qatar bid team, claimed that the allegations would result in Qatar not hosting the World Cup. In an interview published on the same day, Domenico Scala, the head of FIFA's Audit and Compliance Committee, stated that "should there be evidence that the awards to Qatar and Russia came only because of bought votes, then the awards could be cancelled."

FIFA ethics investigation report

In 2014, FIFA appointed Michael Garcia as its independent ethics investigator to look into bribery allegations against Russia and Qatar, the hosts for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup respectively. Garcia investigated all nine bids and eleven countries involved in the 2018 and 2022 bids and spoke to all persons connected to the bids and appealed for witnesses to come forward with evidence. At the end of investigation, Garcia submitted a 430-page report in September 2015. FIFA governing body then appointed a German judge Hans Joachim Eckert who reviewed and presented a 42-page summary of the report two months later. The report cleared Qatar and Russia of bribery allegations stating that Qatar "pulled Aspire into the orbit of the bid in significant ways" but did not "compromise the integrity" of the overall bid process.

Michael Garcia reacted almost immediately stating that the report is “materially incomplete” and with “erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions". In 2017, a German journalist Peter Rossberg who claimed to have obtained the report wrote in a Facebook post that the report "does not provide the proof that the 2018 or 2022 World Cup was bought" and stated that he would publish the full report bit by bit. This forced FIFA to release the original report as authored by the investigator Michael Garcia. The full report did not provide any evidence of corruption against the host of 2022 World Cup but stated that bidders tested rules of conduct to the limit. The report ended talks of a re-vote.

2020

In January, Bonita Mersiades, a whistle-blower from inside Australia's 2022 World Cup bid published a book alleging that leading up to the December 2010 vote, executives with FIFA had been privately worried about a financial shortfall for 2022 if Qatar was chosen, when Al Jazeera (now beIN Sports) agreed a secret deal to pay $100 million in the event that Qatar would host. According to the book, the deal involved Jérôme Valcke, secretary general of FIFA at the time; Valcke was later banned from football for nine years due to corruption. When The Mail on Sunday asked beIN Sports about the allegations, a spokesman described the payment as "production contributions" which were "standard market practice and are often imposed upon broadcasters by sports federations and sports rights holders".

According to leaked documents obtained by The Sunday Times, Qatari state-run television channel Al Jazeera secretly offered $400 million to FIFA, for broadcasting rights, just 21 days before FIFA announced that Qatar would hold the 2022 World Cup. The contract also documented a secret TV deal between FIFA and Qatar's state-run media broadcaster Al Jazeera that $100 million would also be paid into a designated FIFA account only if Qatar was selected in the World Cup ballot in 2010. A further $480 million was offered by the State of Qatar government, three years after the initial offer, bringing the total amount offered by Qatar to $880 million. The documents were handed over to Swiss Police as part of their bribery inquiry.

FIFA refused to comment on the inquiry and responded to The Sunday Times in an email and wrote "allegations linked to the FIFA World Cup 2022 bid have already been extensively commented by FIFA, who in June 2017 published the Garcia report in full on Fifa.com. Furthermore, please note that Fifa lodged a criminal complaint with the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland, which is still pending. FIFA is and will continue to cooperate with the authorities." A beIN spokesman said in a statement that the company would not "respond to unsubstantiated or wildly speculative allegations."

Damian Collins, a British Member of Parliament (MP) and chairman of a UK parliamentary committee, called for payments from Al Jazeera to be frozen and launched an investigation into the apparent contract since the contract "appears to be in clear breach of the rules".

Former UEFA president Michel Platini was arrested by French police on 18 June 2019 in relation to the rewarding of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar. He was detained at the Anti-Corruption Office of the Judicial Police outside Paris. The arrest represents the first substantial public move in an investigation into the Qatar decision opened two years ago by France's Parquet National Financier, which is responsible for law enforcement against serious financial crime.

See also

• FIFA's Dirty Secrets
• Qatar corruption scandal at the European Parliament