{"id":27054,"date":"2026-02-27T06:01:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T04:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers-qa\/channelafrica\/news\/fifa-president-thanks-member-associations-for-support-during-the-last-10-years\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:35:00","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:35:00","slug":"fifa-president-thanks-member-associations-for-support-during-the-last-10-years","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/fifa-president-thanks-member-associations-for-support-during-the-last-10-years\/","title":{"rendered":"FIFA President thanks Member Associations for support during the last 10 years"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-family: var(--global--font-secondary); font-size: var(--global--font-size-base);\">On the 10th anniversary of his election as FIFA President, Gianni Infantino has written to the Presidents of each of the 211 FIFA Member Associations (MAs), thanking them for their support and for helping FIFA transform the governance of the world\u2019s most popular sport.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Listing 11 key achievements since he was elected at the Extraordinary Congress in Zurich, Switzerland, on February 26, 2016,\u00a0 Infantino said: \u201cI believe we have successfully brought football back to FIFA and FIFA back to football. And we have done so together.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Infantino recalled that when he was elected, FIFA faced a crisis that threatened its very existence and that, by voting for him, the FIFA Congress chose to chart a new path forward \u201cbuilt on reform, transparency and development\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>He emphasised that unity between FIFA and the MAs had been a key to football\u2019s transformation. \u201cIt is therefore with a great sense of unity that I would like to extend my deepest thanks for your work, your dedication and, of course, your unwavering support in making this possible and for your role in bringing FIFA back to football over the last 10 years,\u201d Infantino said.<\/p>\n<p>He also spoke of the importance of a strong, functioning FIFA to the sport. \u201cFIFA is the glue that binds the footballing pyramid and the wider footballing ecosystem together,\u201d he said, adding that they had also transformed how FIFA was viewed as an institution. \u201cThis is why a strong, trusted and unified FIFA is not only desirable, but also in fact necessary for our sport to continue to flourish.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He concluded: \u201cThank you for keeping the best interests of football at heart and recognising that although we live in a world marked by division and conflict, football is still the great power that unites us all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;ChannelAfrica&#8211;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":20527,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-27054","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"He emphasised that unity between FIFA and the MAs had been a key to football\u2019s transformation.","published_date":null,"news_description":"He emphasised that unity between FIFA and the MAs had been a key to football\u2019s transformation.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/27054","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/27054\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27327,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/27054\/revisions\/27327"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27054"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=27054"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}