Storm clouds could build up, potentially casting a shadow over Sports buying frenzy in Saudi Arabia and complicate the geopolitical and geoeconomic sports strategies of the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
So far, everything has gone well for the autocratic Gulf states. Despite a decade of harsh criticism and a boycott led by the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, even Qatar turned the success of hosting the event into 2022 World Cup to his advantage.
This could change. A combination of embarrassing revelations, calls to restrict foreign state ownership of football clubs, curbing of Gulf state ambitions by regulators, competition between Gulf states, legal challenges to Gulf funding and of fan protests suggests trouble could be brewing.
The biggest emerging Premier League clubs have asked the government, before the creation of an independent football regulator, to prevent nation states from owning football teams.
The regulator should assess the suitability of potential owners and directors, with emphasis on the “ethics and integrity” component of the tests.
It was not immediately clear whether the eligibility assessment would be retroactive, potentially calling into question the UAE’s ownership of Manchester City.a Qatari offer for Manchester Unitedand Saudi Arabia’s acquisition of Newcastle United in 2021.
Newcastle’s ownership by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund (PIF), could prove most vulnerable.
Some Premier League teams suggest the League’s claim that the kingdom’s “legally binding assurances” that it would not control the club have since been contradicted in court filings in the United States.
In filings, Saudi Arabia described the Public Investment Fund as a “sovereign instrument of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia” and Yasir al-Rumayyan, chairman of Newcastle and governor of the Fund, as “a serving minister of the Saudi government.
A UK Government briefing paper The independent regulator appeared to hedge its bets.
The government said it was designing the eligibility test by allowing for “compromises” and taking note of “the range of corporate structures behind clubs, including complex ownership structures, private capital and funds , sovereign wealth funds and fan-owned clubs.”
Furthermore, the government stated that “the regulator would not be able to make unilateral judgments that risk deviating from foreign policy.” Government officials sometimes defined Gulf state acquisitions as crucial to Britain’s relations.
The eligibility test asks whether similar assessments should be applied to other sectors, particularly media, with Qatari and Emirati investors consider stake in Telegraph Media Grouppublisher of the venerable British conservative newspaper, the Telegraph.
Saudi Arabia’s 2019 acquisition of a 30% stake in The Independent could serve as a wake-up call. The British liberal online publication lent his mark to Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and Turkish language news sites controlled by Saudi Arabia and operating under the kingdom’s strict censorship and repression of freedom of expression and media.
The Saudi restrictions were on display this weekend when Saudi Arabia lost a sparsely attended friendly against Costa Rica at Newcastle Stadium. Breaking with tradition, the Saudi Sports Ministry banned Saudi coach Roberto Mancini and national team players from speaking to the media after the match.
Before the match, a group of Newcastle supporters organized a demonstration against the use of the historic pitch by the Saudi national team. The group NUFC Fans Against Sportswashing held posters of young men who they said were on death row in the kingdom “for protesting”.
The group represents a minority of Newcastle supporters, most of whom appear unconcerned by Saudi Arabia’s abominable human rights record.
Saudi dissident Lina al-Hathloul addressed the protesters. Fans can “both be happy about Newcastle’s victory and criticize what’s happening in Saudi Arabia”, she said.
Ms. Al-Hathloul’s activist sister, Loujain, was arrested in 2018 and sentenced in 2020 to almost six years in prison for “inciting change in the existing basic regime” and “serving a foreign agenda within the kingdom by using the Internet with the aim of harming public order.”
She was released in 2021 but slapped with a five-year travel ban.
The effectiveness of the football eligibility test will likely be complicated by the absence in the Gulf states of a conflict of interest policy allowing government officials to pursue private business interests while serving the public.
The Saudi government’s relationship with Newcastle is arguably unambiguous. The situation is becoming murky with the UAE’s ownership of Manchester City and Qatar’s bid for the club’s rival.
Manchester City is owned by the City Football Group, a holding company in which Abu Dhabi United Group for Development and Investment (ADUG) has an 81 percent stake. Mansour bin Zayed Al Nahyan controls the Abu Dhabi group. He is a member of the Abu Dhabi ruling family and Minister of Presidential Affairs of the United Arab Emirates.
Likewise, it is unclear whether Jassim bin Hamad Al Thani, chairman of the Islamic Bank of Qatar and son of a former prime minister, is personally interested in Manchester United or whether his $9.15 offer for the club East part of a Qatari effort to expand its European franchise.
Britain’s eligibility test is one of several potential challenges to Gulf funding.
La Liga, Spain’s premier football league, has complained to the European Commission that Qatari state aid to Qatar-owned Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) would distort EU markets European by paying sums above the market for the best players.
La Liga filed its complaint under new European Union regulations on foreign subsidies. The rules allow the Commission to investigate financing by non-EU companies of companies operating in Europe and to “address, if necessary, its distorting effects”.
La Liga opened up to allegations of hypocrisy, at the same time time, naming Visit Saudi, the Saudi tourism marketing campaign, as a global sponsor.
How the Commission handles the complaint could have consequences for Saudi Arabia’s eye-watering spending on football players.
For $875 million, these acquisitions allowed the kingdom to acquire 15 foreign players, including superstars Cristiano Ronaldo, Karim Benzema and Neymar. But that failed to seduce Lionel Messi, who opted for Inter-Miami CF and failed to secure Mohamed Saleh from Liverpool before the transfer window closes.
La Liga’s complaint and Britain’s eligibility test aren’t Qatar’s only post-World Cup problems. A recent US court reportedly filed documents Qatar pays $330 million to 14 leaders of FIFA, the world football body before awarding the 2022 World Cup to the Gulf state.
The United Arab Emirates, the state of Teflon in the Middle Eastalso faces embarrassing allegations.
Norwegian football magazine Muckraking Josimar has claimed in a lengthy investigation that Manchester City’s long-standing direct sales partner Qnet had been involved in investigations into human trafficking in Africa involving an alleged Ponzi scheme. Qnet and Manchester City have denied the allegations.
Adding to potential Gulf problems is emerging competition among Gulf states, particularly Saudi Arabia and Qatar.
The Confederation of African Football (CAF) would have canceled rights to Qatar’s beIN network to broadcast interviews with African national teams and clubs after reaching an agreement with beIN’s rival, Saudi Sports Company (SSC).
Around the same time, beIN Media chairman Nasser Al-Khelaifi, as president of the European Club Association (ECA), ruled out the participation of a Saudi club in a reformatted Champions League, the biggest football competition in Europe.
“I don’t know what will happen in a few years, but today I don’t see anyone from outside playing here,” Mr Al-Khelaifi said.
Mr. Al-Khelaifi also chairs the Qatar Investment Authority subsidiary, Qatar Sports Investments (QSI), and is president of Paris Saint-Germain.
Of Saudi Arabia, Peter Frankental, director of Amnesty International’s economic affairs program, warned: “Sports washing affects many sports, and governing bodies must respond achieve this much more effectively.
