Joseph Blatter, just turned 86, was for a long time (from 1998 to 2015) the boss of world football, the head of a huge business, the president of FIFA. Today he is a distinguished man, with his reputation under suspicion, after being disqualified by the organization’s ethics committee. From his residence in Switzerland, while claiming his innocence and moral cleanliness, he talks about his past and his future, and also about football. It had been years since he had given an interview to a Spanish medium.
-I had a health problem, but I’m fit. I live in Zurich, in the house I have occupied since 2005.
It belonged to FIFA, he sold it and I continue to live here. I have installed an office, with another interest in life, but naturally linked to football. It is impossible to leave football when you have worked for 45 years in that organization called FIFA. I’m still linked to football watching it on television. And I am directly part of the Grasshopper.
-How do you remember your time at FIFA?
I made a lot of decisions. The development of women’s football, which practically did not exist when I arrived. And the most important, the development of football as a universal game. Soccer is for everyone, not just from South America and Europe. It has to be present everywhere. Organizing the World Cup in South Africa was a monument, confirming that this region could host major sporting events. The current situation is that the whole world is very selfish, but we must work on unification and not dispersion.
Did presiding over FIFA take years off your life or did you enjoy it?
-I started at FIFA as technical director, as head of development, then as general secretary and finally as president. For me it was extraordinary. When he left the presidency, Joao Havelange told me one day: “Joseph, you have created a monster”. I don’t agree with that monster, but football is now a recognized and important international organization in the social, cultural and economic aspects.
-Especially economic, right?
And also political. Politics comes into play the moment we make the decision to host the World Cup in Qatar. That important date, December 2, 2010, we made the decision to organize two Cups, in 2018 and in 2022… For the decision of 2022 there was a political intervention by the president of France at the time (Nicolas Sarkozy) to change some votes . My idea was that it be Russia 2018 and then the United States 2022. More than for a sporting reason, for a political balance. The situation was not what it is today, with that great conflict between Russia and much of the world, with the exception of China. But the decisions made by the executive committee at that time were not in agreement with mine and the majority of my committee. But we can’t change history.
-That Qatar World Cup should be suspended or changed venue?
-Why? That World Cup was finally decided by the FIFA executive committee in a democratic way. Later, the FIFA ethics commission, together with the American prosecutor, did an investigation and the result said that in the attribution of the 2018 and 2022 World Cups there were no inferences that needed their intervention. In my opinion, there was a political intervention by the French presidency at the time, headed by members of the executive committee such as Platini, but if there were other issues of corruption, I would not enter into it. Personally, I have never been in a situation where some people have offered me blackmail to condition those elections. In any case, now it would be very difficult to change venues. We must play it. It is not a good time, especially for Europe, but it is what it is.
-He has declared that they wanted to eliminate him from football. Why does he think so?
-Because when a person continues with great success, develops football when there was practically nothing before, envy and jealousy are generated. Some don’t like me very much. So when I come to a not very clear situation, which is not clarified yet, naturally they have thought that the best solution is to remove Blatter from football. This is a fact. Finally, the ethics commission eliminated me from football and later the Swiss justice took refuge in that issue to put Platini and me in court. I think it will be fixed in the second part of the year.
-What was that not very clear situation?
-It is about the payment of a salary when Platini worked at FIFA in the years 1998-2002. It is something legal and confirmed by the legal instances of FIFA included in the congress. Two million Swiss francs is the amount, exactly. It was all legal. Hopefully it will be resolved soon.
-When they threw dollars at you during a press conference, they don’t have a very good opinion of you… How do you react to that?
-That is done to turn off the popularity of a person. It was an intervention by an English actor in the middle of a conference, something out of date. But what are you going to do? The conference continued minutes later as if nothing had happened. Life should not be stopped by individual interventions. The human being lives with his character, with his heart and with his soul. And I can say very calmly that of everything I have done there is no court, neither criminal nor any other, that has condemned me. The only thing that is pending at the moment is the issue of Platini’s payment. But neither he nor I are afraid to respond to those who think that we have carried out activities against the law.
-How did your family experience it?
-It’s complicated. My relatives have suffered a lot with all this. Especially my granddaughter, Fellina, at school, at the ballet… her classmates told her that her grandfather was a bad man. And she, a 15-year-old girl, was naturally very angry and had to leave school, change schools. Her dad and her mom also had trouble. They did not understand why they would attack totally innocent children, a 15-year-old girl, because of her grandfather’s cases. And on top of that they have not yet declared themselves against the rules not only of the game but of life.
-Your FIFA was a mafia?
FIFA doesn’t. But some people continue who naturally do not correspond to the ‘fair play’ of football. Those are individual people. I don’t know how many, but ten or more FIFA members at the time, all from South and North America, were arrested in Switzerland, don’t tell me why there, and were sent to the United States. And some were punished for corruption. But FIFA itself is not going to be punished for corruption or being a mafia. FIFA is two million people who are in the whole world to participate in this game. Naturally, of those people who make it up there are some individuals who are not so correct, but to say that FIFA is a corruption or a mafia is wrong. That’s not fair. Neither mafia, nor corruption.
-How do you rate the current president Infantino?
I met Mr. Infantino. I met twice after his election, in 2016. I met him at my house, where he stopped by to discuss FIFA issues. He told me that I gave him problems that were not solved when they suspended me from FIFA and he told me that we are going to fix it later in a second congress in Mexico. And later, in that congress I did not receive any information. Finally I asked the general secretary what happened to the president and his promise to solve my problems and the answer was that the current president and FIFA were not going to discuss directly with the former president, but only through the lawyers . It was the only and the last information I received from that man. I must say that he is rude. It was respectless.
-Infantino is bad at football?
-You cannot harm football because it is a universal game that will continue in the centuries to come. But it is possible that his attitude could affect FIFA. FIFA is made up of 213 associations and if any of them do not agree, they can intervene in the congresses. Unfortunately we have not held conferences in recent years due to the coronavirus issue. But I think that next year one will be organized. It is the national associations that must intervene if they are not happy.
-If they let you return to FIFA, would you return?
-No. Because I have never abandoned FIFA. I always consider myself a member of FIFA, not as president. At no time since FIFA have they told me “goodbye, president, you’re leaving.” I am a member of different football clubs, honorary president of the Grasshopers, and I continue as a member of FIFA. I cannot leave this organization that I served for 44 years and in whose emergence and greatness I participated.
-But he is disqualified… What remains pending to be able to affirm that he is free or that he is not corrupt?
-To the personalities who have carried out an extraordinary mission, society finally recognizes it after their death. I want it to be earlier for me. I’m preparing some information about myself… I’ve made two books, but people especially want to watch television or movies. I want to move forward with that to give a balance of my work.
-Would you like to preside over a club?
-Nerd. He could give some advice, but no. I’ve already been to the highest level of football… What I did accept is to be honorary president of Grashoppers. Only as an honor, not to work. I already worked a lot in football. I was a member of several clubs before joining FIFA. I was a director of Neuchatel, I also worked as a member of the Swiss regional committee for so many years… Not anymore, I prefer peace.
– Do you understand that Russia is excluded from the World Cup in Qatar? How would you have acted?
-It is an issue that the IOC and the FIFA decision committees have to analyze. I don’t have to treat it. There is a great discretion. In my time I was close to Putin and I don’t want to get into Putin’s Russia union policy.
-Imagine Mbappé at Real Madrid? Florentino Pérez wants him as the star of the New Bernabéu…
-Florentino Pérez is a businessman, at the head of the most popular club in the world. He has the idea of organizing other different competitions, but we still haven’t talked together about the Super League that he wants to do. But my heart will always be with Real Madrid.
-Do you think the Super League is good?
-I think that the Super League is not valid in the organization of our football. It is not our world, the European. That is an American issue, from the professional leagues in the United States, closed organizations like the one planned by Florentino and the president of Juve. But that’s not my idea of football. I can’t give my support.
-But with the most important clubs would more income be generated?
– Football does not live on income alone. That’s bad to think about. Soccer is more than that. It counts the cultural, social and educational aspect. Naturally with the intervention of the economy, with its principles of supply and demand, football cannot set limits. But football must not forget that it is a game for everyone, not just for the rich. That is my theory and the one I put into practice for 40 years. It can’t be a rich thing, that’s not football. Soccer is popular, for everyone. If you are going to close this only for the rich, the basic philosophy of football is lost.
