Cup in Qatar | Gianni Infantino, boss of Fifa, feels “Arab”, “gay”, “migrant worker”

An expected and… surprising speech. Fifa President Gianni Infantino said on Saturday that he felt “Arab”, “gay”, “migrant worker”, strongly criticizing, on the eve of the start of the 2022 World Cup, the “moral lessons” of the detractors of the Qatar, which according to him are “hypocrisy”.

In a press conference that began with a long, very theatrical monologue, the Italian-Swiss leader highlighted his Italian origins to ensure that he felt close to the migrants who came to work in Doha in conditions castigated by human rights organizations. “Today I feel Qatari, today I feel Arab, today I feel African, today I feel gay, today I feel disabled, today I feel migrant worker“, he recited in this introductory anaphora.

“This brings me back to my personal history, because I am the son of migrant workers“, he launched. “I know what it means to be discriminated against, to be harassed, as a foreigner. As a child, I was discriminated against (in Switzerland) because I was redheaded and had freckles, I was Italian, I spoke German badly” Faced with the many criticisms of which Fifa has been the target because of the working conditions of the workers on the construction sites of the World Cup, Gianni Infantino affirmed that the international federation was one of the few to worry about their fate.

“Hypocrisy”

“Of the big companies earning billions in Qatar, how many have settled the issue of the fate of migrant workers? None, because a change in legislation means less profit. But we did it“, he launched, before wondering: “Why does no one recognize this progress?“Qatar is regularly criticized by NGOs for its treatment of migrant workers, particularly in the construction, security and domestic work sectors, as well as LGBTQ+ people.

These accusations are vigorously rejected by the authorities, who point out that they have reformed their labor laws, and by the Qatari organizers of the Mondial, who assure that members of the LGBTQ+ community will be welcomed without discrimination, despite laws criminalizing sexual relations between people of the same sex in the country.

“These biased moral lessons are just hypocrisy“, asserted Gianni Infantino, at the head of the supreme body of world football since 2016 and the only candidate for his succession in 2023. “For everything we Europeans have done for 3,000 years, we should apologize for the next 3,000 years before we start lecturing people“, he added.

On LGBTQ+ rights, the leader assured that the Qatari authorities had given him the guarantee that “everybody” was “welcome“during the World Cup.”If someone says the opposite, it is not the opinion of the country, and it is not the opinion of Fifa“, he shouted.