CNN Reports: FIFA President Sepp Blatter clung to power Friday, winning a vote for a fifth-term despite a week marked by arrests, investigations in the United States and Switzerland and questions about whether he is the right man for the job.
Blatter failed to get the required 140 votes in the first round of voting at the FIFA World Congress in Zurich, Switzerland, with 133 votes compared to 73 for Jordan’s Prince Ali bin al-Hussein. But with the writing on the wall — since Blatter would only need a simple majority of votes in the next round to prevail — Prince Ali then conceded.
It’s the latest development in an unprecedented firestorm surrounding soccer’s powerful, polarizing governing body.
This week alone, Swiss authorities announced their investigation into the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bid process. And U.S. authorities unveiled a sweeping, scathing indictment against 14 individuals, several of whom were FIFA officials arrested in Zurich.
Just how did Blatter survive? There’s no better political operator and his knack for getting off clean — or at least without being directly tied to wrongdoing in the soccer world — is uncanny.
Then there’s the matter of the voters and their loyalties to Blatter.
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