Europe's Gianni Infantino on Friday won the presidency of FIFA with a
convincing win over Asian rival Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa
and vowed to lead the scandal tainted body into a new era.
The 45-year-old Swiss-Italian general secretary of UEFA got 115 votes
in the second round of the election held at the FIFA Congress while the
Asian Football Confederation president got 88.
Infantino takes over the 209-member, multi-billion dollar body from Sepp Blatter with world football's image at an all-time low.
Blatter has been banned from football for six years and US and Swiss
authorities have launched major corruption investigations into FIFA and
other football federations.
Infantino said that despite the scandals of the past year football deserves to be "highly respected."
"And we will restore the image of FIFA and the respect of FIFA and
everyone in the world will applaud us," a visibly surprised Infantino
told the Congress.
Sheikh Salman, a member of the Bahrain royal family, was one of the first to congratulate his rival.
Having got 27 votes in the first round of the election, Prince Ali bin al Hussein of Jordan got just four in the second.
Former FIFA official Jerome Champagne had seven votes in the first
round but zero in the deciding ballot. South African tycoon Tokyo
Sexwale withdrew from the contest before the first round.
The Congress was given tough warnings before the vote that the result
and a series of agreed reforms had to convince a world shocked by
several years of corruption scandals and doubts about World Cup bidding.
International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach said football and all sports had to improve governance.
"Today you have this great chance to turn the page," he told the
congress. "We need to give new answers to the new questions with regards
to credibility and good governance."
Earlier a reform package was adopted by 179 members, while 22 voted against and six abstained.
The measures are designed to limit the authority of the new president
and his deputies and end the patronage and waste that prevailed during
Blatter's 18-year term.
The president's job has been altered to function like a corporate
chairman of the board, providing strategic guidance but with less
management authority.
FIFA's executive committee, which had become an epicentre of graft
allegations, has been re-branded as a FIFA council. It will operate like
a corporate board of directions.
Measures such as declaring the salary of the new president to improve financial transparency were also included.
After several years of suspicions, scandal erupted at FIFA when seven
top officials were arrested at a FIFA congress in May last year.
Infantino will face immediate financial problems.
Acting Secretary general Markus Kattner said "general uncertainty"
following the crisis had created tough economic times and FIFA was
roughly $550 million (500 million euros) behind in its $5 billion budget
plan for 2015-2018.
Infantino has proposed increasing the World Cup from 32 to 40 teams
and to more than double the amount given back to the 209 national
associations to more than one billion dollars in total every four years.
Sheikh Salman, who is seen as closer to the FIFA old guard, had said the proposal could bankrupt FIFA.
Infantino countered that his proposals were far from reckless and
that his record at UEFA proved his credibility as a financial manager.
"When I speak about figures...I know what I am speaking about," he said.
Blatter, 79, was the big absentee at the congress. The Swiss sports
baron suffered a spectacular fall over the last nine months. Swiss
police, acting under US warrants, arrested seven FIFA officials in
Zurich two days before his re-election last May. Blatter has since been
banned from football for six years for ethics breaches and could face
criminal charges.
Each of the rivals went into the vote with political problems.
Infantino was for seven years the right-hand man of Michel Platini,
the UEFA president also banned for six years for ethics breaches.
Sheikh Salman had faced tough questions about the clampdown on
pro-democracy protests in the Gulf state. He has called allegations made
by human rights groups "nasty lies."