A day before Qatar kicked off their home World Cup against Ecuador, FIFA president Gianni Infantino struck a defiant, bullish and erratic tone.
Speaking at a news conference, Infantino launched into a wide-ranging and often peculiar address in defence of a tournament that has attracted sustained criticism since FIFA controversially awarded the hosting rights back in 2010.
Those complaints have become more numerous and voluble over recent weeks, and Infantino decided to come out fighting in front of the world's media.
"Today I feel Qatari. Today I feel Arabic. Today I feel African. Today I feel gay. Today I feel disabled. Today I feel [like] a migrant worker," he began.
"Of course, I am not Qatari, I am not an Arab, I am not African, I am not gay, I am not disabled. But I feel like it because I know what it means to be discriminated [against], to be bullied, as a foreigner in a foreign country.
"As a child, I was bullied — because I had red hair and freckles, plus I was Italian, so imagine. What do you do then? You try to engage, make friends. Don’t start accusing, fighting, insulting, you start engaging. And this is what we should be doing."
To understand why the head of world football's governing body — aside from the ever-present motivation of self-preservation — decided to make such statements on the eve of a tournament he would ordinarily be expected to view as a crowning achievement, we must examine how we got here and the consistent complaints and concerns raised against various aspects of the Qatari regime.
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Corruption allegations surrounding the 2022 World Cup
Qatar was the surprise victor in a December 2010 vote in Zurich to award the hosting rights for the 2022 World Cup, beating bids from Australia, Japan, South Korea and the United States.
Russia was awarded the 2018 World Cup at the same session of the FIFA Executive Committee, the first time two tournament hosts had been decided in one sitting after then-president Sepp Blatter changed the rules in 2008, reasoning that this would give the government body a stronger hand in negotiations with broadcasters and sponsors
In total, 22 votes were cast, with Qatar taking 14 in the final round to beat the USA, which claimed eight delegates.
There was a slightly reduced pool of ExCo members for the vote, given Amos Adamu and Reynald Temarii had been suspended amid corruption allegations the previous month. This turned out to be just the tip of the iceberg for FIFA.
Of the 22 men who cast their votes for the tournament, 16 have since been implicated over some form of alleged corruption or bad practice. Most notable among them is Blatter himself, who was initially removed from office and banned from football for eight years in 2015.
That was reduced to six years on appeal but, in 2021, he was given an additional six-year suspension by FIFA's ethics committee for multiple breaches of its ethics code and for "accepting and receiving extraordinary bonuses in the amount of CHF 23 million ($24m/£20.25m)."
In a statement released via his spokesman, Blatter said: "The ethics committee in its current form has nothing to do with an independent body — it is much more the extended arm of the FIFA president [Infantino] and not much more than a 'parallel justice'."
Fraud, corruption, conspiracy. As FIFA looks to move beyond its troubled past, this documentary tells the story of a sport at the centre of a storm.
— Netflix UK & Ireland (@NetflixUK) November 9, 2022
FIFA Uncovered is streaming now on Netflix. pic.twitter.com/v723x6EFbr
In the build-up to Qatar 2022, Blatter told Swiss newspaper Tages-Anzeiger that awarding the World Cup to the Middle Eastern state had been a "mistake" and a "bad choice".
Blatter claimed that a key factor in the decision was former UEFA president Michel Platini being put under pressure to back Qatar by then French president Nicolas Sarkozy. Platini, who was banned from football at the same time as Blatter’s downfall, acknowledged a meeting with Sarkozy but denied being influenced. Sarkozy has long declined to comment on allegations related to Qatar 2022.
Why was Qatar 2022 moved to winter?
As claim and counterclaim of alleged murky dealings swirled around in late 2010 and in the years after, one thing was clear: It's hot in Qatar. Really, really hot. Especially in June, when temperatures exceed 40 degrees Celcius (104 degrees Fahrenheit)
Almost three years on from the Zurich vote in September 2013, Blatter acknowledged this reality. "After many discussions, deliberations and critical review of the entire matter, I came to the conclusion that playing the World Cup in the heat of Qatar's summer was simply not a responsible thing to do," he told Inside World Football.
In February 2015, the FIFA Task Force proposed a November-December staging in 2022, right in the middle of the European domestic football season. It is a decision that has remained unpopular within football's major nations ever since, with the knock-on stresses placed on the calendar by the subsequent coronavirus pandemic a further complication.
However, while the welfare of elite football players and the authorities running roughshod over the fan experience is no small matter, there are far greater humanitarian concerns at play when it comes to Qatar 2022.
🗣️ “Having this schedule, crazy World Cup. The players one eye is on the World Cup.”
— Football Daily (@footballdaily) November 9, 2022
Pep Guardiola has slammed the timing of the FIFA World Cup as players already have one eye on it during the domestic season. 😡 pic.twitter.com/Yx2C1qfSGW
Human rights in Qatar
The argument frequently made in favour of awarding the World Cup to Qatar is how a global event on this scale can lead to greater openness and liberalisation.
The fact similar missives were made around Russia, where Infantino concluded the 2018 tournament by being awarded a medal by Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin, means it is fair to treat them with skepticism.
"Despite government reforms, migrant workers continued to face labour abuses and struggled to change jobs freely," Amnesty International said in its report on Qatar last year.
Curtailment of freedom of expression increased in the run-up to the FIFA World Cup 2022. Women and LGBTI people continued to face discrimination in law and practice.
- Amnesty International report on the Qatar 2022 World Cup.
The report added: "Women continued to face discrimination in law and practice. Under the guardianship system, women remained tied to their male guardian, usually their father, brother, grandfather or uncle, or for married women, to their husband.
"Women continued to need their guardian’s permission for key life decisions to marry, study abroad on government scholarships, work in many government jobs, travel abroad until certain ages, and receive some forms of reproductive healthcare."
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Qatar also retains the death penalty. In his pre-tournament press conference, Infantino bridled at the notion of western values apparently being used as a stick with which to beat his hosts.
"We have been told many, many lessons from some Europeans, from the western world," he told the assembled world's press. "I think for what we Europeans have been doing the last 3,000 years we should be apologising for the next 3,000 years before starting to give moral lessons to people."
It is unlikely such grasping whataboutism will take the focus away from two major areas of concern and protest around Qatar 2022: migrant worker deaths and working conditions, and the rights of LGBTQ+ people.
Qatar migrant worker deaths before the 2022 World Cup
Such a small nation largely lacking in footballing infrastructure winning the World Cup meant a vast stadium-building programme. The means by which this has been achieved and its alleged cost casts the darkest shadow over the World Cup.
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Qatari government figures state there were 37 deaths among workers at World Cup stadium construction sites between 2014 and 2020. Only three of these were classed as being construction related. Infantino reported this figure to the European Parliament in January, although the official state line has been widely disputed.
However, a Guardian report from February 2021, citing records from national embassies, claimed that more than 6,500 workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka had died in Qatar by the time of its report, since the Gulf nation was awarded the World Cup hosting rights in 2010.
Other sources have suggested it is likely that the death toll of foreign workers in Qatar is actually a lot higher, as that figure only includes India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka — not nations such as Philippines and Kenya, who also have large migrant workforces in the country.
Those deaths cannot be officially attributed to a certain project or area of the Qatari construction industry, but they have occurred since the country was awarded World Cup rights in 2010 and started many infrastructure projects to host the tournament — including stadiums, roads, hotels, a new airport and public transport systems.
According to the Guardian report, many migrant workers died from stress-related injuries, such as heart attacks and strokes, because of high temperatures in Qatar nearly all year round.
A number of suicides have also reportedly occurred, with some suggestions that the tough working conditions may have been a factor in that toll. We will, of course, never know that for sure. These causes of death have all been recorded as 'natural causes', according to Amnesty International, which also disputed the extent to which government reforms to curtail abusive employment practices have been implemented.
Qatar itself insists it has made reforms to address such concerns, with officials insisting that the death toll among the migrant workforce is proportionate for a country of Qatar's size.
"The mortality rate among these communities is within the expected range for the size and demographics of the population," the Qatari government said in a statement by a spokesperson. "However, every lost life is a tragedy, and no effort is spared in trying to prevent every death in our country."
LGBTQ+ rights in Qatar
Consensual sexual relations between men aged 16 and above are punishable with up to seven years in prison under article 285 of the Qatari penal code.
In October 2022, Human Rights Watch published research on the Qatar Preventive Security Department, which operates under the Interior Ministry.
The report claimed the arrest of six Qatari LGBTQ+ people who were subjected to beatings, sexual harassment and other ill-treatment while being detained. Under the terms of their release, transgender women detainees were, according to the report, mandated to attend conversion therapy sessions by government security forces.
A month later, as the World Cup build-up gathered pace, Qatar World Cup ambassador Khalid Salman described homosexuality as "damage in the mind" in an interview with German TV channel ZDF, before adding that being gay is "haram", which translates as "forbidden" in Arabic.
Salman’s comments undermined the efforts of tournament chiefs to present a picture of openness.
"We have a country that's conservative, however we are a welcoming country," 2022 World Cup chief Nasser Al-Khater said in 2020. "We are open and welcoming, hospitable. We understand the difference in people's cultures. We understand the difference in people's beliefs and so I think, again, everybody will be welcome and everybody will be treated with respect.
"Just like our culture is a culture of this world, we also expect people to respect our culture. I think there's a balance and there's a feeling that people will respect people from everywhere."
One analysis of Infantino’s bizarre identity proclamations is that his status and privilege allow him the luxury of being able to say "today, I feel gay" without fear of any repercussions. The findings of Human Rights Watch and Qatar’s own penal code suggest such freedom is not widespread at this, the most controversial World Cup in modern history.
