Infantino attends Dominican Republic tourney despite calls to stay away
FIFA president Gianni Infantino has landed in the Dominican Republic to witness an U-14 youth tournament in the country despite being asked to stay away by stakeholders of the round leather game.
Recall that CONCACAF president Victor Montagliani personally wrote to Infantino asking him to reconsider attending the tournament, saying his presence would “undermine the sporting character” of the youth tournament.
Montagliani argued that the mounting “governance crisis” surrounding Infantino would draw heavy media scrutiny, overshadowing and “undermining” the children’s competition
However, Infantino defied requests to skip the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) Under-14 Series youth tournament in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic when he arrived in the country to meet with local political and football leaders.
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Infantino was received on arrival in the country at the Punta Cana Airport on Saturday by the Minister of Sports, Kelvin Cruz, and the president of the Dominican Football Federation, José Francisco Deschamps.
The development highlights a deepening “civil war” within global football governance as Infantino faces widespread calls to resign after leaking a secret project—the FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) proposal.
The plan which aimed to sell a 20% commercial stake in the World Cup to private equity investors led by Joshua Kushner has been met with heavy criticism from lovers of the game who are against Infantino’s proposed moved and have accused him of deception” and a “fundamental breach of trust”.
