English Football Association chairman Greg Dyke has written to every FIFA executive committee member calling for “urgent action” to ensure ethics investigator Michael Garcia’s report into World Cup bidding is published in full.
Dyke’s action follows Garcia’s move to appeal against the decision by FIFA ethics committee judge Hans-Joachim Eckert to clear Russia and Qatar to host the 2018 and 2022 tournaments, having found no serious breaches of bidding rules by either nation.
Eckert’s findings said there was no reason to rerun the bidding – and criticised England 2018 for its relationship with disgraced former FIFA executive member Jack Warner.
Eckert has refused to published the full report and Dyke states that public confidence in FIFA has hit a new low, while there is “compelling evidence” of wrongdoing.
The letter comes after his predecessor as FA chairman, David Bernstein, urged European nations to boycott the 2018 World Cup unless FIFA undergoes more reforms.
Dyke’s letter states: “As you probably know the reputation of FIFA was already low in England and much of Europe before the events of last week.
“The failure to publish Mr Garcia’s report, and his statement that the summary report which was published contained ‘numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations’, has resulted in a further decline in public confidence of FIFA.
We cannot go on like this. Complete transparency is required if the actions of all those who bid, including England 2018, are to be judged fairly.” Bernstein has resigned from his role on FIFA’s anti-discrimination task force and he called for even more drastic action.
“There are 54 countries within UEFA,” he said. “There’s Germany, Spain, Italy, France and Holland – all powerful. You can’t hold a serious World Cup without them.
“They have the power to influence if they have the will. The choosing of Qatar was clearly one of the most ludicrous decisions in the history of sport. You might as well have chosen Iceland in the winter.”
