Infantino Named New Fifa President

26 Feb 2016 | tshego

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Gianni Infantino is the new FIFA president after collecting 115 votes from a second round of voting.

The Uefa secretary general polled the most votes in round two, 27 more than closest rival Sheikh Salman bin Ebrahim al-Khalifa, with 88.

Prince Ali bin al-Hussein was third with four, while Jerome Champagne was eliminated after the first round, which failed to determine an outright winner. Tokyo Sexwale withdrew before voting began in Zurich.

At the start of the day, there were five candidates looking to replace Blatter; Sheikh bin Elbrahim al-Khalifa, Gianni Infantino, Prince Ali bin al-Hussein, Tokyo Sexwale and Jerome Champagne. Tokyo Sexwale withdrew from the presidential race before the first round of voting took place.

The Football Association (FA) had already agreed to support Infantino in the election, with the Scottish FA also behind the 45-year-old.

Each candidate was given 15 minutes to address congress before voting starts at around 12:00 GMT. The election process included a second round of voting, after no candidate was able to secure the required number of votes first time around.

Sheikh Salman was the pre-vote favourite to become the next president due to his support from the Asian confederation as well as Africa.

Blatter had been in charge of FIFA since 1998 but was recently banned from football activity for six years, alongside ex-UEFA boss Michel Platini. The pair were found guilty of breaching FIFA’s ethics rules regarding a £2m “disloyal payment”.

The 79-year old announced he would be standing down last year amid the growing corruption crisis affecting the world governing body.

In addition to the vote, delegates have agreed reforms to end the problems that have put the body into crisis to help restore the organisations reputation, which were approved by 179 of 207 member associations.