You have to give FIFA some credit for even saying the right things as it has taken years of bribery and corruption for it to even get to this point. Last weekend, FIFA elected a new President for the first time since 1999. The member bodies chose Gianni Infantino, a Swiss administrator, who quickly announced that a new era for the organization had begun.
Perhaps more importantly FIFA passed a series of structural and process reforms which were designed to bring the organization into the 21st century and demonstrate to U.S. authorities that it really is going to change from its prior culture. As reported in the New York Times, these measures included a basic segregation of duties component by “seeking to divorce FIFA’s commercial enterprise from its policy making and to shift power away from a handful of individuals at the top.” There were all changes in the governance structure to limit the President’s term down from four to three years; mandate public disclosure of compensation; and require six women occupy top leadership slots.
