The meeting chaired by the FIFA President, Joseph Sepp Blatter, was the Executive Committee’s first meeting of the year at the home of FIFA in Zurich, lasting for two days.
Racism and discrimination at a point became the focal point of the meeting that amounted to Sepp Blatter clearly showing his displeasure about the rampant occurrences regarding racism and discrimination.
“Racism and discrimination are such scourges in society, and therefore in our sport, that we need to take concrete actions and do more than we have done in the past to eradicate them from football. We shall work on education and prevention on the one hand, and on disciplinary sanctions on the other” stated FIFA President.
A number of reports were given on the upcoming FIFA competitions and events and the following decisions were arrived at:
Considering the FIFA Confederations Cup slated in Brazil this year, the executive noted with great satisfaction that the tournament has already been a popular success, with 75% of tickets already sold.
On the goal-line technology, it was agreed that two systems will be selected by 2 April, 2013.
In the case of World Cup Qualifiers for the African zone, the dates for Group F games was re-scheduled to allow Nigeria arrive in Brazil on time for the FIFA Confederations Cup, instead of 7 and 14 June, 2013 it has been postponed to 5 and 12 June, 2013.
Based on new guarantees received from the Costa Rican public authorities as well as the report received from CONCACAF, the executive re-appointed Costa Rica as hosts of the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup-2014 tournament.
Also, the preliminary draw for the 2018-FIFA World Cup in Russia will take place in Saint Petersburg on 24 or 25 July, 2015 while the match schedule of the Women’s World Cup in Canada-2015, which will see 24 teams participating, was provisionally approved.
Iraq has been granted the approval upon their request to resume playing international friendly games at home, while the 2013 Ballon d’ Or will take place in Zurich on the 13 January, 2014.
Again, following a request from the Jordan Football Association, the executive decided to donate USD 200,000 worth of football equipment and kits to Syrian refugees living in a camp at the border between Syria and Jordan.
The Club World Cup competition to be hosted in Morocco and the Beach Soccer World Cup all in the year 2013 saw their match schedules approved.
The next meeting of the FIFA Executive Committee will be held in Mauritius on Tuesday, 28 May 2013.
Credit: Shiva Oppong Banahene
