FIFA is to set up a taskforce of 11 people to look at reforming football’s scandal-hit world governing body.Proposals for reform will include term limits for presidents and integrity checks for top officials, president Sepp Blatter announced.
FIFA will hold an extraordinary Congress to elect its new president on February 26 2016, he added.
Blatter, 79, announced he would stand down in June – just four days after being re-elected president.
Term limits for officials, central integrity checks for executive committee members and the disclosing of all salaries and payments to FIFA members will be the main focus of the reform taskforce, Blatter said – although he did not go into more details.
The set-up of the committee would be like “10 players and a coach”, he added, with one key person – the ‘coach’ – driving the process.
UEFA president Michel Platini said the creation of the panel was “an important step”. Speaking after the FIFA executive committee meeting he said: “We must now make sure that the reforms outlined today will be undertaken in a swift and effective manner. We need to reform FIFA and we need to do it now.”
Blatter believes the steps to reform could be his legacy. He said: “I am still the elected president by 133 associations and I will use my mandate as president as a responsibility and mission to make sure that at the end of February, I can say FIFA has started to reform and to rebuild the reputation of FIFA.”
But anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International, citing the fact the committee would not be fully independent of FIFA, said of the move: “This will not be sufficient to win back trust in FIFA.”
The organisation’s director of communications, Neil Martinson, added: “FIFA has promised reform many times before and failed dismally. They have failed fans and supporters today.”