ASIA – Choose Your Next AFC Presidential Candidate

There is a constant theme in World Football leadership: take the money, hide what goes on and hold on to power for as long as possible, at all costs. This is wrong. Football belongs to us all, yet we are neglected and ignored by the many self-serving ‘caretakers’ of the game. Who do these people think they are? We all know who they are, they are the people who have overseen the greatest series of scandals in the history of sport.

We are ‘changeFIFA’ and we think it time for this to change. The time for transparency, accountability, shared leadership and democracy in World Football has come.

In the coming months the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) may seek a new President should Mohammed bin Hammam be found guilty of breaking FIFA financial regulations (see below link). The time is now for a NEW ERA in world football leadership.

We are asking you, football fans of Asia, to tell us who you would nominate to stand as the next reformist AFC President. When we have a clear choice, we will work to get your candidate nominated for the election once the position becomes vacant. The candidate will represent the people of Asia, genuine transparent governance and a future for the game not built on self-interest that we can all trust, respect and believe in.

We are waiting to hear your ideas on Twitter at @changeFIFA. It is time to take our game back. The revolution begins now.

Related articles

• FIFA Uncovers New Evidence On Mohamed Bin Hammam (sbnation.com)

FOOTBALL IN THE DARK AGES

 

……….George Carlin would have known what to do with FIFA…

Joseph S. Blatter cannot be FIFA President forever. As you ponder which players your team might sign before the window closes, men in dark suits with agendas the size of 100 football pitches laid end-to-end are sneaking into position to take the throne when he leaves in 2013. These men want to conrol the wonder that is sometimes called ‘The People’s Game’. That name is a slap in the face to anyone whose pulses race when their team runs out onto the pitch.

The selection process has nothing to do with you. You have no influence over who pulls the strings from the sport that decides your mood patterns every weekend. This is wrong. Very wrong. It would be bad enough to stomach if the Presidential elections were transparent, but they aren’t. Do you really know what goes on when they make the selection? You don’t, unless you find yourself on the inner circle in Switzerland with a whiskey in your hand and friends in the right places. That papalesque smoke floating out of FIFA HQ isn’t a sign, it’s cigar smoke. And it stinks.

It is time this stopped and football was transformed into a modern, democratic organisation where everyone would be welcome to input their vote. This is not a whimsical, unrealistic pipe dream. A new FIFA is possible, but change will not come from within the organisation. Why would they force change? To paraphrase George Carlin, FIFA forcing change is like fucking for virginity. It is really not hard to blame them for wanting to keep things the way they are, it is entirely human nature.

Those men eyeing the prize want the same. FIFA needs to change, not more of the same. But how? The people who love the game are football’s only hope of meaningful change. A few boos in 2002 were enough to unsettle the President, imagine what the boo of every fan who loves the game would achieve? It would be a deafening roar, one which would blast the system into a million pieces. By standing together and demanding change football can be transformed. If things carry on as they are nothing will change and we will simply be left in the dark forever.

 

FEAR IS KILLING FOOTBALL

Roseanne wouldn’t take crap from a man in a blazer, unless she needed tickets…

Since this article was written we are incredibly encouraged by the attitude of journalists who are deciding that enough is enough and FIFA must be tackled.

Somebody, probably Roseanne Barr, said “the key to change is letting go of fear”. That’s easy for her to say, but her survival doesn’t depended on accreditation and tickets for the big games. Sadly for ChangeFIFA the very people who could really help spread the word and get the campaign out in the open are paralysed by fear: Sports Journalists. If they show themselves to be crossing FIFA then it’s a cert their careers would be in jeopardy. Their bosses who rely on reports from the big international games would never allow it. Over the past few weeks many superb journalists have confided that they love the idea of a movement to force change and create a new democratic FIFA, but that they couldn’t possibly get involved. Their fears are understandable on several levels, but this isn’t the Lives of Others, it’s our favourite game we are talking about here.

It is also possible to see FIFA’s position. They do not want what they perceive as divisive journalists stirring up trouble, especially those wanting ‘their’ tickets. So, we are left with a situation where everything just carries on going around in circles of negative energy. The cycle needs to stop. FIFA needs to invite change, journalists must be free to express their fears constructively. At the very least they must be free to align themselves with movements calling for change in the way football is run.

Will this happen? Absolutely. Too many people love the sport for it to continue to be run in such a closed way which inhibits freedom, afterall ‘freedom of the press’ is what draws so many great minds into journalism. It is wrong that intelligent writers who feel passionately about the sport of which they write feel afraid to comment on FIFA, especially when it concerns championing transparency, democracy and modernisation. Football is not East Germany and I think even Roseanne Barr would be able to see that.

Follow this link, join our Facebook group and help us all to make FIFA a democracy…

IS CHANGE AT FIFA NEEDED?

Andrew Jennings, with his back to the wall…

There is a man in England who has taken FIFA to task repeatedly over the years, his name is Andrew Jennings. His probing investigative journalism has not been welcome at FIFA HQ. They would rather he didn’t exist. They claim his stories are bad for the image of the game. Our suggestion is that you read his website and make your own mind up.

Follow this link to read Transparency in Sport

POSITIVITY IN ATTACK

The future of the people’s game has to be the people…

This website will hopefully avoid becoming a portal for wild attacks on FIFA. Only with positivity in attack and a friendly, yet hard approach will the ultimate objective be met. Real change at the top of football will only happen if there is an organised and professional approach to challenging the status quo. The current regime and its forthcoming continuation will welcome an angry rabble taking potshots at it. What it will not be able to ignore is a tight controlled unit backed by the force of global opinion.

It is highly probable that around a billion people around the globe love football. Many of them will have no clue how FIFA operate, if they did it is likely they would back this campaign to ‘change FIFA’ and make it a democracy where they could vote on who runs the game. FIFA will not be able to resist the will of the people. Our belief is that it is entirely possible to encourage 1 million people to join the Facebook group. Individually none of us can realistically force change, as a collective will they simply have to listen.

This is not a vanity project. As lovers of the game we want it to be respected, that can only be possible if it is shared by us all, the fans and players of the sport. It is wrong that unelected men dictate how the game should be operated and played. They will point to legal statutes that have been passed over time. It is time these were torn up and the game modernised.

Should enough interest in this campaign develop the plan is to create a team to manage the campaign. At all times the vision will be to take the game to the people. Please keep coming back to this site for news on how the campaign is developing. Forward this onto your friends who also love football, only together in positivity can we force change.

HELP MAKE FIFA A DEMOCRACY

Football, Soccer, Calcio, Futebol, Futbol – the name changes but it is a universal language: ‘The People’s Game.’ Unfortunately, at the moment it is anything but.

This website aims to be the startpoint of a drive to return the game to the people; to make FIFA an organisation with a President and board voted in by the people who play, watch and love the game. Public vote is the greatest system of accountability and fairness known; We can make it work with FIFA.

With enough support we believe we can negotiate with FIFA to realise our objectives, which are:

* To allow football fans to become members of FIFA

* To give these FIFA members the right to vote for future FIFA presidents

* To allow any person to become a FIFA presidential candidate

In this way, football will be given the leadership it deserves, chosen by those who love the game. Our aim is to create a database online of people who love the game enough to register their support and help us to apply pressure on those ‘running’ the game – FIFA – to stop the current ruling system in football and realise our objectives.

What we would love you to do is join our Facebook group, even if Facebook isn’t your thing. We chose this medium because it offers a well known system which is easy to register on and offers a visible platform for monitoring how many people believe in the cause. By joining this group you are helping to take football out of the hands of those who currently control it and to give it back to the people. Help us realise this vision and create a modern, transparent sport to be proud of.

ChangeFIFA was created in June 2010 by Oliver Fowler and is currently a self funded campaign.

Follow this link, join our Facebook group and help us all to make FIFA a democracy…