Friday 01 November 2019, 11:46

FIFA and AFC fostering good financial governance in Bangladesh 

  • Three similar missions have recently been organised worldwide, this one being the first joint one with a Confederation

  • Main topics discussed during the meetings involved financial and governance areas, central review findings and FIFA recommendations for the next steps

  • "We are hopeful that in the near future with the support of FIFA and AFC we will be able to achieve better results which will benefit the football family as a whole in Bangladesh."

Recently, on 21 October, a joint mission involving representatives of FIFA and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) successfully took place with the Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) at their headquarters in Dhaka, the vibrant capital city of more than 9 million inhabitants.

During the three day mission, different meetings were conducted with the support of the BFF’s General Secretary, Abu Shohag, the President and the Senior Vice President of the Federation, Kazi Salahuddin and Abdus Murshedy, the CFO and financial manager, Abu Hossain and Anupom Sakar, the Head of AFC MA Services, Domeka Garamendi, external Senior Consultant, Samuel Panthradil, two members of the FIFA Financial Governance Team along with their colleague from the FIFA Regional Office in New Delhi.

The main topics discussed during the mission involved both the financial and governance areas, specifically the 2017 Central Review findings and the improvements made from that central review until today, further needed improvements and other recommendations were also discussed along with good financial governance guidelines.

The Member Association (MA) has been under restricted funding since June 2018 due to some issues identified during the 2017 Central review. Therefore, the purpose of this mission was to assess the current status of the MA and support them to improve the situation that led to this restriction.

Together with members of the AFC delegation, representatives of the FIFA mission acted as mediators and liaised with the different actors involved, through sharing case studies and best practice examples. This was carried out with the football’s world governing body’s aim, which is to help the MA in improving and achieving the desired outcomes.

The CFO of BFF, Abu Hossain, noted: “The recent financial governance mission which was conducted jointly by FIFA and AFC was very vital for our Federation. It was immensely helpful and it helped gauge our progress. We are hopeful that in the near future with the support of FIFA and AFC we will be able to achieve better results which will benefit the football family as a whole in Bangladesh. We would like to express our sincere thanks to the members of the team who have played a very delicate and supportive role for the betterment of the Financial Management and Compliance of our Football Federation.”