By Duncan Mackay
June 5 – Legal reasons today prevented suspended FIFA vice-president Jack Warner from publicly revealing details of e-mail correspondence between himself and Sepp Blatter, the President of football’s world governing body.
The Trinidad and Tobago Government Minister had promised that he would read out the e-mails to supporters at a a special gathering in his constituency in Chaguanas.
But he disappointed a crowd of several thousand by reiterating his innocence of the charges against him but said he would not be making public the emails after discussions with his lawyers.
Warner, also President of CONCACAF, has been provisionally suspended pending a full investigation by FIFA’s Ethics Committee nto allegations that, together with Mohamed Bin Hammam, the President of the Asian Football Confederation, he tried to bribe several members of the Caribbean Football Union (CFU) to back Bin Hammam in the Presidential election against Blatter.
Warner said: “I had plans to speak to you today a bit more on this matter but the best legal advice I received has suggested that I do not do so at this point in time and that advice I am going to respect.
“I haven’t thieved anything, I haven’t given anybody anything and I don’t know what the hullabaloo is all about.”
Referring to Bin Hammam, he said: “My friend came here to talk to some people, he spoke to them and then he left.
“The rest is now history and let the facts come out.”
Warner also hit backed critics who have called for Trinidad Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar to fire him from his Government position as Minister of Works and Transport before the FIFA investigation is done.
But Warner told his supporters that he would not abandon his political role in Trinidad.
“If it comes to a choice between FIFA and you [his constituents], the choice is you,” he said.
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