News

Qatar May Lose Its World Cup

by L. Turner
Amin M. Jamali/Getty Images Sport/Getty Images

It's been a bad week for the world's favorite sport. Thanks to an ongoing corruption investigation, FIFA may re-vote on Qatar's bid to host the 2022 World Cup. Setting aside whether it was a good idea to host a massive test of intense physical endurance in one of the world's hottest, most forbidding climes, it turns out Mohamed bin Hammam, a Qatari and former member of the FIFA executive committee might've bribed senior soccer officials to get the country the bid. With, you know, about $5 million in cash, gifts, and legal fees, according to the Sunday Times.

Also, the planned stadium looks like a giant vagina.

The news of the potential corruption comes on the heels of another gigantic scandal FIFA with which FIFA is currently wrestling: Allegations of match-fixing at the 2010 World Cup. So it's been a pretty awkward week for the world's preeminent soccer organization.

If the re-vote goes through, FIFA would have to reopen the bidding for the Cup. On Sunday, FIFA's vice president, Jim Boyce, said he'd (maybe) support a re-vote if the corruption detailed in the London Sunday Times is proven, according to the BBC. The organization's top investigator, Michael Garcia, is currently looking into the charges, and Boyce said he'd follow Garcia's lead.

If Garcia comes up with concrete evidence and concrete evidence is given to the executive committee and to Fifa, then it has to be looked at very seriously.
The FIFA executive committee are 100 percent behind Garcia. He will be allowed to go and speak to anyone from around the world to complete his mission.

Qatar's winning 2022 World Cup has been mired in scandal, most notably surrounding its selection in the first place. But the country has also been thrust into the spotlight for mistreating workers constructing the World Cup complex. FIFA's president, Sepp Blatter, has said awarding the Cup to Qatar was "a mistake."

Photo: AFP/Getty Images