FIFA harshly criticizes the World Cup, calling it 'disorganized' by Brazil.
"The Maracanã is not a World Cup stadium," criticized Secretary-General Jerome Valcke today, regarding the renovation being carried out by one of Governor Sergio Cabral's closest friends; "We don't have airports; in 1986, Colombia was forced to give up."
247 - The Brazilian government and state public administrations are playing with fire by allowing disorganization to prevail in the construction of stadiums and infrastructure for the 2014 World Cup. There have been cases, such as Colombia in 1986, of countries that lost the right to host the World Cup due to internal problems. There, it was the violence of drug trafficking. Here, hopefully that won't happen; it could be the issue of administrative confusion. The escalation of criticism from FIFA may be a sign that, at any moment, the world's highest football authority may finally lose patience with Brazil and adopt more drastic measures.
FIFA has shown its continued concern about the slow pace of Brazil's preparations for the 2014 World Cup, declaring that officials seem to have invested more energy in securing Brazil's selection as host than in actually organizing the tournament. "We don't have stadiums, we don't have airports," said Secretary General Jerome Valcke on Friday at a football forum in Moscow.
He added that it seemed increasingly likely that some facilities, including the Maracanã stadium in Rio de Janeiro, would only be ready a few weeks before the start of the World Cup. "The Maracanã is [still] not a World Cup stadium," said Valcke, adding that in Brazil "the main issue is not organizing the World Cup, but winning the World Cup."
Brazil, which won the right to host the World Cup after other South American nations withdrew their bids, has been mired in organizational and bureaucratic problems since being announced as the host country in 2007. Workers went on strike this month, paralyzing construction at the Mineirão Stadium in Belo Horizonte, one of the cities vying to host the opening match, along with Brasília and São Paulo.
On the 15th, the Chamber of Deputies approved the basic text of the provisional measure that creates special bidding rules for the construction of stadiums and other works for the World Cup and the Olympics, known as the Differentiated Public Procurement Regime. However, the voting on the provisional measure will only be concluded with the voting on the proposed changes presented by the opposition, which should take place next week.