Cairo: FIFA president Sepp Blatter shrugged off criticism of safety standards at this summer's World Cup stadiums insisting that the problems "are not very important".
He also hit out at consumer protection groups which he claims have exaggerated the situation.
"It's not acceptable," said Blatter who is in Cairo to attend the opening of the African Nations Cup, which gets under way on Friday.
"We had at the end of last year the reports of our inspection group on the problems of four stadiums, problems which are not very important."
He cited "the roof on the Frankfurt stadium, the stands at Kaiserslautern, minor problems at Nuremburg and at another stadium".
"All of sudden an organization which is used to being in charge of the control of the market prices in consumer groups, they thought they should go and look to see if the World Cup stadiums in Germany were able to organize the World cup and they said 'NO'," he added.
"No doubt all twelve stadiums of the World Cup will be fully equipped and secured.
"There will be no problem with the security of the stadiums, for the people, spectators, players, referees, and the media. Everything will be OK."
"Don't forget that we are working in a country with 'Grundlichkeit' (German efficiency)."
German consumer protection watchdog Stiftung Warentest last week warned of "serious deficiencies" in security at four of the 12 stadiums to be used during the football finals starting in June.
The independent group released a study last week showing that the Olympic Stadium in Berlin, the Veltins Arena in the western city of Gelsenkirchen and Leipzig's Zentralstadion in eastern Germany were ill-equipped to cope with a stampede.
The Stiftung Warentest study found that there was no plan to allow fans to enter the pitch in case of a mass panic.
Horst Schmidt, a vice-president on the World Cup organising committee, hit back Tuesday with a demand that the group "revise its report".
"The image this study gives our stadiums in Germany or abroad does not correspond at all to reality: these stadiums have in place the most efficient security measures possible," Schmidt said.
"We think that the study in question is very debatable since it doesn't take into account the complexity of the question of security (experts) have deliberated a subject without linking it to the whole question of security."
Blatter also said on that he personally favoured having six African nations at the 2010 World Cup, which would mean one extra team.
He added that Africa needed a good showing at this year's World Cup plus approval from the FIFA executive committee.
He said, "I personally favour having six African nations at the 2010 World Cup which means hosts South Africa and five other nations. In that way, no one else would lose a place."
He added the allocation of teams for each continental confederation would be decided by the FIFA executive committee at the June 9 to July 9 finals in Germany.
Comments
0 comment