The first elections of the National FA in the capital Male' on 20 July was a watershed in the growth of civil society in the Maldives. I view this process within the context of the mega democratisation project the people of this country have embarked upon. I am a serious participant in this project. The process is fuelled by people committed to the cause. It is therefore appropriate that we get ourselves up to date on the ground reality at the time of this controversial FAM elections.
Articles of Association
The teachers of this country have decided to use our Articles of Association (Law No. 1/2003) to regain their rights and a decent living. The tourism workers followed suite. We now see sports groups joining in. Civil society exploded onto the national stage to the pleasant surprise of an unsuspecting public.
This development disturbed those officials who controlled these interest groups through institutionalised government mechanisms. They were loosing their grip! They were also unable to come up with a strategy that satisfied a crop of a sophisticated opposition they never thought existed. The government have been aloof and paternalistic to this unprecedented mega-democratisation project. They had so far only paid lip service to the people's calls for Reform. The intention was to fool the International Community. The International Community however do not appear to be fooled. It now appears that it is only the International Sport Community that have been fooled so far!
The International Sport Community
Civil society suddenly took new meaning. Into this rather explosive environment, enters the FIFA! A premier member of the "respected" International Sports Community. The Viceroy turned out to be the powerful Secretary General of the Asian Football Confederation, Dato' Paul Mony Samuel. A "team spirit" of shocking proportion emerged between the government officials who were loosing their "grip" and the incoming FIFA Official who in reality came to save the FAM from this government grip!
The rather aloof Dato' Paul instead chose to turn a blind eye to calls for a strategy that would enable the FAM to transit into a meaningful civil society organisation. That is the installation of "members" rather than "individuals" into the FAM Interim Transition Committee. Requests to meet the good Viceroy were breezily brushed off! It appears our first meeting with the International Sports Community did not go too well. We need more engagement, more transparency. After all we are talking about civil society!
Government or Civil society?
The FA was an already established organisation bound by a culture of "government" rather than civil society. The government could comfortably be classified as an autocratic one party dictatorship. This was the point from which the transition process had to start.
Contrary to what we were led to believe as per the FIFA Statutes, it suddenly became brutally clear that the FIFA too were more interested in the "status-quo". They immediately endorsed the prevailing status-quo. They staged a "grand" elections with a flurry of activity by important FIFA and AFC Officials. Our "boys" were well mannered, pleasant and most of all obedient. They executed the project to the letter. By these standards Chairman Shahir definitely did a great job! They endorsed the associated corruption. The also endorsed by-passing 80 member clubs and granting the vote to a mere 11 "big" clubs. This amounted to just 12% of the Maldives Football "electorate".
So much for Article 17 of the FIFA Statutes! The FIFA Official Dato' Paul told the press that voting rights for a small number of clubs were "appropriate" for the Maldives. It may come as a surprise to the informed onlooker who probably remember that our Articles of Association beg to differ with this "unilateral" decision of the FIFA official. Our Articles of Association do not discriminate between "rich" and "poor" clubs. Neither did the FIFA Statutes!
But to our shock and horror Dato' Paul was more interested in the government machinery that have been holding the FAM hostage for the last few decades. The FIFA Statutes mandate the FIFA administration to free up such associations from government control! We have however seen the FIFA do the exact opposite.
I foresaw two possible reasons for the good Dato' to come to the conclusion that the interim committee must be composed NOT of "members" as per Article 17, BUT of "non-member individuals" of his choosing which was not consistent with this Article. The more innocent reason was to believe that the FIFA Official did not have had any idea of the mega-democratic transition project into which he had stepped into when he entered the territory of this 90 member strong Maldives Football Association. The other is more sinister. Control! by whatever means.
It eventually turned out that the FIFA preferred the "control" option rather than the "free-up" option. Interests naturally aligned well for both parties. Government represented by some "loose" minister on the one hand and the rather aloof FIFA Official Dato' Paul on the other.
This is definitely another setback for Maldives football. This time at the hands of the FIFA! By its own admission the FIFA official paternally admitted that the next elections will be FAIR! Oh, what Joy!
While the teachers and tourism workers are rapidly evolving into an exemplary model of democratic civil society, the FAM was moving backwards. One could argue that we were the "innocent" victims of corrupt forces that emanated from inside and outside of this country.
Corruption
Firstly, the fact that an international NGO, FIFA was allowed to intervene was tantamount to being caught with our pants down. It was corruption of the FA through government control that prompted the FIFA into action. But lo and behold, forces inside and outside of this country immediately aligned to secure one of the two hundred or so votes that made up FIFA. The result was a process so compromised that even dumb little Maldivians could not help the stink!
I was therefore compelled to post the following comment in our rather "silent", but well informed maldivesoccer website.
Article 17 clause 2 states "Any Member’s bodies that have not been elected or appointed in compliance with the provisions of par. 1, even on an interim basis, shall not be recognised by FIFA". Granted that our interim committee was appointed as per par. 1, by FIFA and it was therefore an independent appointment, the starkly obvious requirement that a member's body shall consist of members, who are CLUBS leave the committee exposed! what a preposterous oversight even for FIFA and Dato Paul! Oh my....!!
Undemocratic
So what does this mean? The AFC suddenly comes out with allegations of corruption based on media reports of offers to buy votes from clubs contesting in the FAM elections! It appears this was a ruse to re-direct the gaze of an alert section of the football community from the real source of this corruption.
The real source of this corruption was the interim committee's undemocratic composition! That is the absence of members in a member's body. Instead, there were a handful of carefully selected individuals who did not represent member clubs. The question then is, does the FIFA Statutes mandate a FIFA Official to accommodate individuals rather than members as required by Article 17?
Terrible as it may sound, we have yet again been taken for a ride! Appointing individuals instead of representatives of member clubs appeared deliberate and did not have a legal or moral basis. The whole point of member's bodies was that the individuals representing a member clubs would be democratically elected and therefore accountable to the members of that club who in turn is accountable for it's good standing within the family of associated football clubs that make up the association.
The non-member "Individual" on the other hand have no one to be accountable to except he who appointed that "Individual". Therefore, the loyal Chairman, Shahir's assertion that he had conducted affairs as per strict orders from his appointees. The FIFA and AFC Officials who oversaw the congress admitted that all decisions were endorsed by the FIFA and the AFC. The "winners" seemed content!
Prescriptive paternalism
It therefore appears the FIFA prefers to be prescriptive. There appear to be no other reason for the FIFA to interpret Article 17 as permitting the appointment of individuals so that they will be answerable to FIFA to the exclusion of the association's members. If this is what FIFA means when they claim that it is their "corporate social responsibility" to democratise national associations, there may emerge a difference in opinion that stares in opposite directions.
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