Very positive meetings between FIFA and Polish and Ethiopian delegations

Two very positive meetings took place today, 9 March 2006, at FIFA House in Zurich, with a FIFA delegation headed by the FIFA President receiving governmental and football representatives from Poland and Ethiopia to discuss matters related to the football associations of the two countries. 

In the first case, the Polish delegation, headed by the Honourable Minister of Sports Tomasz Lipiec, and accompanied by the Polish Ambassador to Switzerland Janusz Niesyto and the President of the Polish FA Michal Listkiewicz, talked with FIFA about the situation regarding the discrepancies between the National Law on Sports in Poland and the FIFA Statutes. In September 2005, the FIFA Executive Committee set a deadline of 15 July 2006 for these discrepancies to be solved, otherwise measures may be taken against the Polish FA.

Mr Lipiec expressed his personal will and that of the Polish government to make the appropriate amendments to the National Law on Sports in order for it to comply with the statutes of all international sports organisations, including the FIFA Statutes, and indicated that he would work in close cooperation with the Polish FA in this matter.

The FIFA President, who led a delegation which also included UEFA Executive Committee member and Malta FA president Joseph Mifsud and FIFA General Secretary Dr Urs Linsi, acknowledged the positive attitude of the Polish Minister of Sports and offered the assistance of FIFA’s legal experts in this process.

In the afternoon, the State Minister of Youth and Sport of Ethiopia, Abdissa Yadeta, and the president of the Ethiopian FA Dr Ashebir Woldegiorgis, led an Ethiopian delegation received by FIFA, headed once again by the FIFA President.

Both parties agreed that Ethiopian football had made good progress in recent years and reiterated their desire to keep working together in order to further develop the beautiful game in the African country, specifically through the building of new headquarters for the association and the implementation of the Goal projects awarded to the Ethiopian FA.

(fifa.com)