Pressure continues to mount on FIFA president Gianni Infantino after Jordan Football Association (JFA) president Prince Ali bin Al Hussein accused world football’s governing body of attempting to pressure his federation into supporting Infantino’s bid for another term in office. In a strongly worded statement, Prince Ali alleged that the JFA was subjected to undue pressure during preparations for the recent FIFA World Cup, claiming the world body linked its assistance on several operational matters to the federation’s backing of Infantino’s re-election campaign.
He described the alleged conduct as “blackmail,” escalating the growing controversy surrounding FIFA’s leadership.
“There is no shortage of issues regarding FIFA. Let me start by clarifying what some of these are from an FA perspective, in particular that of Jordan going into a World Cup for the first time. We are a small country with a minimal budget for our FA, and we had to deal with enormous hurdles. First, getting our fans into the USA: not all were granted VISAS, even though they had tickets, which we also know were sold at exorbitant prices. Secondly, we are being taxed by the US govt through FIFA for our participation. Money that should go to players and staff. This was not the case for those who played and set up camp in Canada and Mexico. But we happened to be in the USA, so now we face these huge costs in taxes for having participated,” he wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
“Thirdly, we have been waiting for reward money for our players since December for the Arab Cup in Qatar, which is a FIFA event. The money our team should receive for having reached the final has not been delivered yet, while at the same time FIFA brags about how many billions they have in reserve,” he added.
According to Prince Ali, the issues included support for fan visa arrangements, taxation matters involving the United States government, and the distribution of prize money from the 2025 FIFA Arab Cup, in which Jordan finished as runners-up.
The latest accusations come at a difficult time for Infantino, who has already faced widespread criticism over his now-abandoned proposal to introduce private investment into FIFA’s commercial operations.
“It is clear the problem really is with leadership. For months, FIFA has been refusing to help us on any of these or other matters- until it was verbally communicated to me during the World Cup that if I endorsed Infantino, it would go a long way to helping our FA out,” he wrote.
“We pride ourselves in Jordan in upholding ethical values. We did not endorse him before and certainly will not now. But the whole situation amounts to blackmail, and we refuse to give in to that,” he added.
Jordon’s presence at FIFA World Cup
Prince Ali is no stranger to contesting FIFA’s top office, having stood against Sepp Blatter in 2015 and then challenged Infantino in the 2016 election, where he finished third.
On the pitch, Jordan made history by qualifying for their maiden FIFA World Cup, held across North America. Drawn alongside Austria, Algeria and defending champions Argentina in Group J, the Asian side found the competition tough, exiting after three defeats despite scoring in each of their group-stage matches.
