What is the name of a soccer-loving Swiss nonprofit that demands tax exemptions and concessions on workers’ rights wherever it goes?
The answer, as Brazil is discovering as it prepares to host the 2014 World Cup, is the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) – an organization that faces a long list of corruption charges and presents an even longer list of demands for countries hosting the world’s premier sporting event. (FIFA’s status as a charity dates back to its days as a small voluntary organization.)
The Brazilian Congress is being pressured by FIFA to pass a “General World Cup Law” that would alter existing national law in a number of areas the world football body considers key to its interests – including stricter copyright protection and enforcement, ownership of all event-related images and broadcast rights and a reversal of current policy of providing half-price soccer match tickets to students and seniors.