FIFA president Gianni Infantino says most member associations support his bid for re-election, following an endorsement from the Asian Football Confederation on Friday, the Jamaica Observer reported.<\/p>\n
Speaking to the BBC on Saturday, Infantino argued that differences within football\u2019s governing body should be resolved through its democratic process. He said member associations would ultimately decide who should lead FIFA and how it should be run.<\/p>\n
The AFC endorsement bolsters the 56-year-old\u2019s pursuit of a fourth term ahead of the presidential election in March. According to the report, no challenger had come forward, with nominations due to close on November 18.<\/p>\n
Infantino\u2019s comments followed controversy over a proposal to sell a portion of the commercial rights to FIFA competitions to private investors. The plan provoked a backlash two months earlier and was subsequently abandoned. He apologised for the failed project last week.<\/p>\n
The opposition had included the heads of UEFA, the AFC and CONCACAF, the confederation covering North and Central America. They signed a letter asserting that football belonged to no individual.<\/p>\n
Despite that dispute, Infantino pointed to the AFC\u2019s backing after his visit to Tokyo. He also said all African countries had endorsed him during a visit to Cape Verde and that he was speaking with associations around the world. Those broader claims of support were attributed to Infantino in the report.<\/p>\n
He acknowledged that bringing different opinions together was difficult and said he respected those views. With the nomination deadline approaching, the next question is whether another candidate will enter the contest before member associations make their choice in March.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An Asian endorsement strengthens Infantino\u2019s bid after the investment-plan backlash.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6449,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-jamaica"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/6449"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tringlobe.news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}