Fifa is playing dumb when it knows the Qatar World Cup is morally indefensible

You cannot escape the World Cup in Doha. Vast posters of the tournament’s likely stars adorn the imposing skyscrapers of West Bay, simultaneously caught in action and suspension. The restaurants and apartment blocks of Al-Sadd use flags of all 32 teams as bunting; decoration does not appear to be optional. Travel in from the airport and you virtually bump into two of the stadiums.

This is, of course, exactly the point: the more you think about the World Cup, the less you think about everything else. Fifa would like to turn each of its host countries into World-Cup-land and there are few better canvases than Doha, a kind of Stepford Wives sporting platform where space and budgets are limitless. In 2014, the largest distance between two stadiums was over 2,500 miles, in 2018 it was 1,800 miles. In Doha, you can travel between the two most separate locations of this tournament in 50 minutes by car.

Those stadiums are the great legacy of this World Cup, just not how Fifa might have liked, because they remind us who gave the most to make this happen. Not Fifa president Gianni Infantino. Not the players or the managers, many of whom have dreamt of these weeks but never envisaged it quite like this. But the migrant labourers, working for not enough and treated and protected not well enough, and the victimised, who still suffer in silence.

These are supposed to be the days of crowning glory for every Fifa president, when they look down over an opening ceremony that they pretend has a logical narrative and survey their kingdom. For Infantino, it means more still. He rents a house in Doha and has remained insistent that this World Cup will be the best ever World Cup until the next World Cup comes along and we must all wow and bow again. He would have got away with it if it wasn’t for those pesky human rights organisations.

We are four days away from the tournament beginning and, frankly, none of the serious questions have been met with appropriate answers. The treatment suffered by Qatar’s LGBTQ+ community, either through physical violence or forced existence in fear and detailed forensically by i’s special correspondent Patrick Strudwick over the last week, should be a cause of deep shame for world football’s governing body.

The compensatory migrant workers’ fund, an initiative first raised by Amnesty International in April and since given strong support by several national teams and high-profile individuals, has still not been confirmed by Fifa. Qatar’s Labour Minister Ali bin Samikh Al Marri accused anyone extolling that idea of racism, suggesting that no agreement will be found.

The compensatory fund is not a perfect answer: how do you allocate the money? Who allocates the money? How much is the right amount of money? But the point is that this should have been ensured proactively. You do not get awarded the World Cup because you might make reparations to mistreated migrant workers; you get awarded the World Cup because you agree on a system that treats migrant workers appropriately.

Infantino’s response has been fascinating because it has been entirely contradictory. He cannot have been surprised by the nature of these questions or the fierceness with which they were asked (or, if he has been surprised, that is depressing in itself), and yet has lurched from blissful ignorance to glorious revisionism.

First, the ignorance. At some point last week, perhaps after the questions were getting a little too awkward, Fifa sent letters signed by Infantino and Fifa secretary general Fatma Samoura urging all 32 competing nations to “please, let’s now focus on the football” and “not allow football to be dragged into every ideological or political battle that exists”. It was a lamentable moral escapology act.

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But then… behold Infantino the superhero, here to save the world one football tournament held in a state with a dubious human rights record at a time. This is Infantino in charm offensive mode, with the emphasis on offensive. Listen how he tells us that football is for all (apart from the people he’s being asked about!) Marvel at how he says that football unites the world over and over again until he believes it.

On Tuesday, Infantino had the gumption to use a speech at the G20 summit to urge Russia and Ukraine to reach a ceasefire for the duration of the tournament because “football and the World Cup are offering you and the world a unique platform of unity and peace all over the world.” Which is akin to having your cake, eating it and then expecting the baker to pile their entire shop window into a doggy bag for you to take home.

Infantino is clearly prepared to test our resolve. Ironically given the circumstances, it doesn’t wash. You can play dumb, asking people to stop picking on the uber-wealthy country with the poor human rights record and holding up your hands to say “hey, we’re just having a little football tournament here, stop reading too much into it”. You can aim to solve the world’s problems through football – goodness knows we need something. But you cannot do both at the same time and be taken seriously.

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