Jack has no sympathy as journalist Jennings dies

■ Anna Ramdass

anna.ramdass@trinidadexpress.com

FORMER FIFA vice-president Jack Warner is unsympathetic over the death of investigative journalist Andrew Jennings.

'All I would say is that he should have died a long time ago,' Warner said when asked yesterday for a comment on the death of the journalist.

Warner said he was not aware of Jennings' death until this newspaper informed him.

'I shed no tear for him and I maintain he should have died a long time ago,' he said.

When asked about his own health, Warner, who is a Covid- 19 survivor, said he is doing fine.

An Associated Press (AP) report stated yesterday that a post from Jennings' official Twitter account stated that he died on Saturday 'after a brief, sudden illness.' No more details were given.

Jennings, 78, has had a stormy relationship with Warner in his pursuit of investigating and uncovering corruption at FIFA.

'If I could've spit on you I would've spat on you,' Warner told Jennings at an airport in Zurich, Switzerland, when he (Jennings) was unrelenting in demanding answers from Warner.

Prior to the 2010 general election in T&T, Warner had accused Jennings of being part of a plot by the People's National Movement (PNM) to smear his name-a claim that Jennings denied.

According to the AP report, Jennings pursued evidence and wrote books that rocked the reputation of international sports organisations and their leaders while pioneering the more intense scrutiny they would later face from the media. His books, including The Lords of The Rings published in 1992 and Foul! in 2005, proved to be essential texts to better understand the politics and conduct around the International Olympic Committee and FIFA, the report added. 'He would typically be the reporter at their news conferences asking the most direct and provocative questions,' the report stated.

It added that Jennings and his work proved to be a foundation on which American authorities built their sprawling investigation of international soccer officials.

The fallout forced then-FIFA president Sepp Blatter, a longtime Jennings target, out of office. Jennings also made investigative documentaries about FIFA for the BBC.

Those programmes hastened the exit of Blatter's predecessor, Joao Havelange of Brazil, from his honorary titles at FIFA and the IOC.

'If you had to put only one name to the revolution of the international sports debate over the past 30 years … that name and that person would be Andrew Jennings,' wrote Jens Sejer Andersen, director of the sports integrity campaign group Play The Game.

CONFRONTATION: Former FIFA vice-president Jack Warner, left, and investigative journalist Andrew Jennings in a screen grab outside an airport in Zurich, Switzerland, in 2007.