Fifa to award ‘peace prize’ after Donald Trump pipped to Nobel

Donald Trump is set to receive Fifa’s inaugural “Peace Prize” on Friday afternoon, marking a new high point in the friendship between the US president and his counterpart at football’s governing body, Gianni Infantino. 

The new award, which Fifa announced a month ago, will be bestowed during the World Cup draw at Washington’s Kennedy Center — which Trump now chairs after ousting its board in February.

Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum are also due to attend the draw. The three countries will co-host the tournament next summer.

Fifa has so far remained tight lipped on the identity of the prize winner. When asked at an event recently if Trump would receive the award, Infantino said: “You will see.” 

But Trump is expected to be honoured for his efforts to end conflicts in Gaza, Ukraine and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Infantino has previously said Trump should receive the Nobel Peace Prize for his work to secure a ceasefire in Israel’s conflict with Hamas in Gaza. But the Norway-based committee gave this year’s award to Venezuelan opposition leader María Corina Machado. 

Friday’s glitzy event will be co-hosted by German supermodel Heidi Klum and Hollywood actor Kevin Hart, and includes a live performance by the Village People. The band’s 1970s disco hit YMCA was a mainstay at Trump’s presidential campaign rallies. 

Trump and Infantino have struck up a close bond in recent years. The Fifa president has made regular visits to the White House and Mar-a-Lago, attended Trump’s inauguration in January, and opened a new Fifa office inside Trump Tower in New York in July. 

At a business event in Miami last month, Infantino said he considered Trump “really a close friend” and called on his opponents to respect the result of the 2024 election by supporting his policies.

“He has such an incredible energy and this is something that I really admire,” Infantino said of Trump. “He does things. He does what he says. He says what he thinks. He says, actually, what many people think as well, but maybe don’t dare to say.”

Trump, who appeared on stage at the same event soon after, hailed Infantino as “big stuff”. The US leader said he would not have been president during next year’s World Cup were it not for the “rigged election” in 2020 that subsequently led to him running again in 2024. Trump has repeatedly falsely claimed that Joe Biden stole the 2020 election.

“It wasn’t supposed to be that way,” Trump said. “I’m sort of happy the ways things worked out.”

The US president has embraced the World Cup and football more broadly as a platform for reaching billions of people around the globe. This summer, he handed out the trophy at Fifa’s new Club World Cup and then stayed to celebrate with players from the winning team, English Premier League side Chelsea.

Last month Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo joined a Saudi delegation to the White House led by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Trump said his son Barron was a “big fan” of the 40-year old Ronaldo, who now plays in Saudi Arabia.

Fifa has secured important wins ahead of next summer’s World Cup. Ticket holders for the tournament will be granted expedited visa appointments under a new scheme announced last month, while Trump’s “big beautiful bill” on tax and spending that was passed in July set aside $625mn in federal funding to help host cities with security costs.

Fifa officials have rejected the idea that the peace prize is simply a sop to Trump, and pointed to previous accolades it has handed out to politicians.

In 2019, Fifa gave Mauricio Macri its first “Living Football Award”, six months after Argentina’s then-president invited Infantino to give a speech at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires.

Infantino has since become a regular attendee at such diplomatic gatherings, including the meeting of world leaders in Egypt in October for the signing of the deal for a ceasefire in Gaza and the return of Israeli hostages held in the territory. Macri now chairs the Fifa Foundation. 

In a letter to The Guardian newspaper last month, Fifa’s media director defended the new prize. “Rather than be criticised for endorsing peace in a divided world, Fifa should be recognised for what it is — a global governing body that wants to make the future a brighter place.”

However, one former Fifa official described the accolade as “surreal”, “brazen” and a clear violation of the organisation’s professed political neutrality. 

“This is the world they live in — where being shameless is an advantage,” the former official said. “You have to have a good relationship with a host nation — but this goes beyond that.”

Fifa did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Fifa has provided no details of how the peace prize was conceived or how the winner will be chosen, prompting criticism from campaign groups about a lack of transparency.

Human Rights Watch said it had written to Fifa to “request a list of the nominees, the judges, the criteria, and the process” for the new prize, but had received no response.

Source: Financial Times
--Agencies