Thank you for reading and relying on TulsaWorld.com for your news and information.
Advertisement
“His ambition was to make football a global game, calling it the universal language”.
Havelange, whose name is one of those used for the track and field stadium for the Rio Games (Estádio Olímpico João Havelange), played a key role in bringing the Olympics to his country. FIFA had always been a primarily European nexus of power, and football authorities elsewhere in the world were expected to take their cues from their European betters.
The former Olympic swimmer and water polo player for Brazil had been in and out of the hospital in recent months. During his presidency, three former top officials, now disgraced for their involvement in corruption, Ricardo Teixeira, Chuck Blazer and Jack Warner, joined the governing body’s executive committee.
An imposing figure, with piercing blue eyes, his astuteness as a politician and his adeptness at retaining power enabled him to hold the Federation Internationale de Football Association presidency for 24 years until being succeeded by Blatter in 1998.
In 2013, the soccer body’s ethics court judge Joachim Eckert said Havelange’s conduct had been “morally and ethically reproachable”.
“Havelange was one of the biggest figures in world sport and number one in football”.
But Havelange was also stalked by controversy. China was readmitted in 1980 having left the organization in 1958. I think this is something that will be [judged by] history, that will naturally always put something [about the scandal], but let him (rest) in peace now.
A law graduate, businessman, and talented sportsman who represented Brazil in both swimming and water polo, Havelange also helped bring global football into the modern commercial era through corporate sponsorship and television rights.
His tenure as president is the second longest in FIFA’s history, behind only that of Jules Rimet.
Joao Havelange led the Brazilian delegation and led them to the 1956 Melbourne Olympics. He joined the International Olympic Committee in 1963.
Samaritano was where Havelange had been treated for pneumonia in July.
Advertisement
“Rest in peace, Joao”, Blatter said. “Football – your passion, my mission – is in good shape”.
