The head of Jordan’s Football Association claimed yesterday that an attempt had been made to blackmail him into supporting Gianni Infantino, the much-criticised president of FIFA.
In a lengthy post on X, Prince Ali bin Al Hussein — president of the Jordanian FA and a half-brother of King Abdullah— said FIFA is deducting US government tax from payments to Jordanian players and staff who took part in the World Cup.
“This was not the case for those who played and set up camp in Canada and Mexico. But we happened to be in the USA so now we face these huge costs in taxes for having participated,” he wrote.
According to Prince Ali the Jordanian team have been waiting since December to be paid for an earlier FIFA event: the Arab Cup in Qatar:
“The money our team should receive for having reached the final has not been delivered yet, while at the same time FIFA brags about how many billions they have in reserve.
“It is clear the problem really is with leadership. For months, FIFA has been refusing to help us on any of these or other matters — until it was verbally communicated to me during the World Cup that if I endorsed Infantino it would go a long way to helping our FA out.
“We pride ourselves in Jordan in upholding ethical values. We did not endorse him before and certainly will not now. But the whole situation amounts to blackmail and we refuse to give in to that.”
In another post on X, last Saturday, Prince Ali called for an end to secret ballots in elections for FIFA’s presidency. “Every other decision, including hosting the World Cup, is now done openly,” he wrote, arguing that a transparent ballot is the only way to hold member associations accountable in front of their own football fans, officials and players.
“At the same time it is protection for each and every MA [member association] who might be pressured to make a decision based on coercion behind closed doors as has happened in the past.
“But most importantly it will empower each and every MA on the most critical vote we have, the leadership of the biggest and most popular sport in the world and the direction it takes in the future.”
Prince Ali has unsuccessfully contested several elections for the FIFA presidency himself. The 2015 election was won by Sepp Blatter who promptly resigned in the midst of corruption allegations. Prince Ali came third in the election for a successor, which was won by Infantino.