Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Question for FIFA: How many Watches Were Returned?

Last September, FIFA investigated a gift of expensive watches giving to its top officials. Here is what it found:
[The Confederação Brasileira de Futebol] distributed 65 gift bags, each containing a Parmigiani watch, to a group comprising the 28 officials on the FIFA Executive Committee, a representative from each of the 32 Member Associations competing in the 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil, and a representative from each of the 10 Member Associations in Conmebol. CBF produced records indicating that it obtained the watches from Parmigiani, a CBF sponsor, at a price of USD 8,750 each. The Investigatory Chamber commissioned an independent appraisal of one of the watches CBF distributed. That appraisal determined that the watch had a market value of CHF 25,000. That value was confirmed by a later appraisal done in Zurich.

The FCE [FIFA Code of Ethics] plainly prohibits such gifts.
So FIFA asked for the 65 watches back, and stated that it would donate them to a charity organizations.

However, FIFA has never followed up, to my knowledge, to account for compliance to its request for the watches to be returned or to identify the charity to which the watches were donated. I have asked FIFA for this compliance information, and have yet to hear back.

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