PRC: Former Soccer Chief Sentenced for Bribery

Facts

• Following one of the sport's most extensive anticorruption investigations in years, Chen Xuyuan, the former president of China's National Football Association (CFA), was sentenced to life in prison on Tuesday, according to Xinhua news agency.¹
• Chen pleaded guilty to corruption in January and admitted to taking bribes totaling 81M yuan ($11.2M). Numerous coaches and players have been the subject of investigations as part of Pres. Xi Jinping's ongoing anti-corruption campaign.²
• Investigators discovered Chen had exploited his positions with the CFA from 2010 until 2023. The court verdict stated that Chen caused "tremendous damage" to soccer in the PRC and that his illegal profits would be recovered and turned over to the state.³
• Chen apologized to supporters and asked for forgiveness. After Chen had "admitted and repented his crime" and cooperated with the inquiry, the court claimed it had shown clemency because China still uses the death sentence for corruption.⁴
• Several well-known names in Chinese football were also sent to prison for corruption, including CFA Super League Company CEO Dong Zheng, former high-ranking soccer official Chen Yongliang, and former National Athletics Association head Hong Chen.⁵
• China's soccer leagues have long struggled, with gambling gangs benefiting from payoffs to players and referees. Meanwhile, the PRC's men's and women's national teams have both struggled in international competitions.⁶

Sources: ¹Al Jazeera, ²BBC News, ³The Guardian, ⁴CNN, ⁵Associated Press and ⁶BusinessMirror.

Narratives

• Pro-China narrative, as provided by XINHUA. As part of the Communist Party's plan to clean up sports by fighting corruption, a court has delivered a just sentence. Chen Xuyuan was given a life sentence for match-fixing, taking bribes, and financial crimes. As part of Xi Jinping's goal to make China a football superpower by 2050, he plans to build thousands of new football fields and enroll kids in new football academies — as well as root out corruption.
• Anti-China narrative, as provided by DW. Xi Jinping's anti-corruption campaign is taking things too far. Life in prison and the death penalty for corruption are unusual punishments for white-collar crimes in the Western world, but not uncommon in China. Human rights organizations have long accused the Chinese government of using torture to extract alleged corruption confessions. For an issue like corruption in sports, this verdict was too strong.

Predictions