The senior leadership of Fifa has reaffirmed its support for president Gianni Infantino after an emergency meeting in Morocco aimed at addressing the internal fallout from the abandoned FIFA Forward Enterprise project.
Infantino, Secretary General Mattias Grafström and members of the FIFA Management Board met on Wednesday at FIFA’s regional office for Africa in Salé, near Rabat.
The meeting followed growing criticism of the proposed FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE), which was withdrawn by Infantino last week after opposition from within and outside the governing body.
In a statement after the meeting, FIFA said Grafström and the Management Board members present had expressed their “full support” for Infantino, describing him as the organisation’s only official elected by its 211 member associations.
Infantino also backed Grafström and FIFA’s administration, praising the work being done to implement his plans and organise the 2026 World Cup.
The leadership agreed that communication and coordination between the president, secretary general and Management Board needed to be strengthened, alongside improvements to the organisation’s decision-making processes.
FIFA said the measures discussed in Morocco were designed to improve governance, rebuild confidence and promote a more united and transparent approach among its senior officials.
The FFE proposal was a central issue during the discussions.
The plan would have established a separate company to oversee some of FIFA’s most important commercial activities, including broadcasting, sponsorship, licensing, ticketing and tournament delivery.
FIFA had placed a value of about $20bn on the proposed company and considered selling as much as 20% of it to external investors.
Such a transaction could have generated approximately $4.2bn, with FIFA arguing that the additional funds could significantly increase the money available for football development among its member associations.
However, the proposal faced opposition because of the planned involvement of private investors and concerns that FIFA’s Council, confederations, national associations and senior administrative officials had not been adequately consulted.
FIFA has now admitted that mistakes were made in the way the project was handled.
Following the Rabat meeting, the organisation said the consultation process should have been conducted differently and acknowledged that the FIFA Council and member associations should not have been left feeling excluded.
A separate apology was sent to the FIFA Council and all 211 national associations, with FIFA promising to take steps to prevent similar problems in future.
The governing body will also conduct an internal review of the FFE process. Its findings are expected to be presented at the next scheduled meeting of the FIFA Council.
FIFA has not said who will carry out the review or whether its eventual findings will be made public.
The organisation maintained that, despite the mistakes it acknowledged, all actions connected with the FFE proposal complied with its regulatory framework.
It also confirmed that the project had been permanently abandoned.
The meeting in Morocco came after several senior figures publicly distanced themselves from the proposal and criticised how it had been handled.
Grafström had earlier described the preceding week as an extraordinary and difficult period in an internal message to FIFA employees. He referred to a “sad and reproachable series of events” and confirmed that the FFE project had been permanently abandoned.
FIFA Chief Operating Officer Kevin Lamour said employees had been “deceived” and described the initiative as the project of one person.
Senior adviser Carlos Cordeiro resigned in opposition to the proposal, while FIFA’s Chief of Global Football Development Arsène Wenger said he had not been involved and only became aware of the plan through media reports.
There has also been opposition outside FIFA. UEFA has said it no longer has confidence in Infantino’s leadership, while former Portugal international Luis Figo has publicly called for the FIFA president to resign. Several European associations have also withdrawn their previous support for his re-election.
The Rabat meeting was therefore an important attempt by FIFA to demonstrate that Infantino continues to have the backing of the organisation’s day-to-day leadership.
FIFA also used the meeting to reject allegations that Infantino had offered Morocco the 2030 World Cup final in exchange for political backing.
British newspaper The Times reported that Infantino had allegedly offered Morocco the opportunity to host the final as he sought to strengthen his position ahead of FIFA’s presidential election.
A FIFA spokesperson rejected the claim as “false and misleading”, saying Infantino had made no commitment about where the final would be played and that FIFA would decide the venue at a later stage.
Morocco will co-host the 2030 World Cup with Spain and Portugal, while Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay will each host one centenary match. FIFA has yet to officially determine the venue or country for the final.
The Royal Moroccan Football Federation endorsed Infantino’s re-election bid in May.
The next FIFA presidential election is scheduled for the 77th FIFA Congress in Rabat on 18 March 2027.
