Former Brazil great Zico met with FIFA President Sepp Blatter on Wednesday to ask for changes in election eligibility rules at soccer’s governing body.
Zico has announced he wants to run for FIFA’s presidency after Blatter leaves in February, but is struggling to fulfill the requirement of having at least five federations supporting him as a candidate.
Zico said that this rule needs to change because local federations are pressured by their confederations and can’t make their own choices.
He said Blatter was very receptive to his letter calling for the changes, and said the president also didn’t agree with the current rules.
“It’s difficult,” Zico told after meeting with Blatter at FIFA’s headquarters in Zurich. “The way things are right now, it’s very difficult for anybody to become a candidate.”
So far, Zico only has the support from Brazil and needs to find other four federations to back him by October 26 in order to become an official candidate.
He expected to have the support of Turkey and Japan, countries where he spent a lot of time playing and coaching, but said the local federations are being pressured against supporting him.
“The federations must be allowed to make their own choices,” Zico said. “Blatter agrees with that, and hopefully things will change in the future. If we can achieve that, it would be a significant accomplishment going forward.”
FIFA said Blatter received Zico as a courtesy and at the former player’s request, and said “there was no discussion on the merits of the FIFA presidential election rules.”
Zico later published the “open letter” he delivered to Blatter with a list of 10 points “essential for the reform process,” including the need to “reform the FIFA presidency” through term limits, transparency and “an open and transparent electoral” process.
“Elections are one of the key things to be reformed,” he wrote. “After all, an election under the current rules can only serve those already committed to current system.” Zico said he has the “ideal platform for advancing” changes at FIFA.
Blatter can’t actually do much about changing the election rules. Any changes would have to be approved by FIFA’s executive committee.
UEFA President Michel Platini is considered the frontrunner to replace Blatter next year.
Swiss asks for Valcke’s Emails
FIFA has been urged by Switzerland’s attorney general to hand over emails used by Jerome Valcke, its secretary general who was suspended last week.
Valcke was implicated by a FIFA ticketing partner in using his FIFA and Google email accounts to discuss a 2014 World Cup black market tickets deal. The office of Swiss federal prosecutor Michael lauber has now stepped up pressure on FIFA to unblock access to Valcke’s correspondence.
lauber’s spokesman Andre Marty said on Wednesday that the prosecutor has filed a request directly to FIFA lawyers.
“I can confirm that we now want to have access to these sealed email accounts,” Marty said. “The OAG (office of the attorney general) asked FIFA to deliver all information coming from Valcke’s multiple email accounts,” he said, adding that so far, “FIFA didn’t deliver this email information.”
In a statement, FIFA said: “We are committed to cooperating with authorities and this is an ongoing process.”
Valcke denies a ticket agent’s claims that he sought cash from sales of top-category tickets for matches in Brazil he knew were being offered at several times face value.
FIFA released Valcke from his job last Thursday hours after the allegations were made, and requested a formal investigation by the FIFA Ethics Committee.
Valcke likely faces sanctions even if financial corruption is not proven.
The FIFA code of ethics allows for charges of breach of confidentiality and loyalty, which could be leveled simply for doing official business through private email accounts.
Swiss agrees to extradite
BERN (Switzerland): Switzerland’s justice ministry says it granted a US request to extradite Venezuelan football official Rafael Esquivel in a FIFA bribery investigation.
The justice department says Esquivel is “accused of receiving bribes worth millions of dollars in connection with the sale of marketing rights to the Copa America tournaments in 2007, 2015, 2016, 2019 and 2023.”
Esquivel can appeal the decision within 30 days at Switzerland’s federal criminal court.
The former Venezuela football federation president was among seven men arrested on May 27 in early-morning hotel raids in Zurich, two days before the FIFA presidential election. He is the third person whose extradition to the United States has been approved.
Esquivel faces 20 years in prison on racketeering charges.