By Andrew Warshaw, chief correspondent
April 24 – Here we go again. Veteran FIFA powerbroker, about to be exposed, quits citing health reasons. The figure this time is 84-year-old Nicolas Leoz, head of CONMEBOL, who has announced he is stepping down as well as relinquishing his place on FIFA’s executive committee, held since 1998.
The 84-year-old Paraguayan has led South American football for over a generation and had heart surgery for the fourth time in December. But his resignation could hardly be more timely.
Leoz, as has been widely reported, is one of the FIFA bigwigs who allegedly accepted illicit payments from FIFA’s former commercial partner ISL, a World Cup kickbacks saga that is finally expected to be exposed in full by FIFA ethics judge Hans-Joachim Eckert in the next few days after being repeatedly postponed.
Eckert is due to make his ruling after studying the report of FIFA corruption buster Michael Garcia – the investigative head of the two-pronged ethics committee – into the ISL case which implicated no fewer than four executive committee members and linked former FIFA president Joao Havelange and his former son-in-law, Ricardo Teixeira, to payments totalling $22m from 1992-2000.
Havelange resigned his 48-year IOC membership in December, 2011, just days before the IOC was due to take action against him in its own probe of the ISL case while Teixeira resigned his football duties last year, including head of Brazil’s World Cup organising committee. He, too, cited health reasons after Switzerland’s supreme court ruled the ISL report should no longer be kept secret.
Leoz allegedly received $730,000 though no action has yet been taken again him.
“I’m announcing my retirement from all FIFA committees because it’s important for my life,” said Leoz. “A very important committee is the organising committee for the 2014 World Cup but important reasons prevent me from staying in that position. I still have good mental health but physically I’m often impeded. Long trips make it impossible for me to continue with my work, they tire me tremendously. I’m coming to an age when I’m going to let the younger ones take my place.”
Leoz has constantly denied any wrongdoing but was clearly not prepared to wait for the results of the ISL scandal, especially with FIFA’s reform proposals, including age and term limits, due to be approved at its Congress next month.
He insisted, however, he was quitting with a clear conscience. “I feel very happy because I’m retiring with the tranquillity and knowledge of having done a sincere, honest job.”
“This is a strictly personal decision. I don’t have the needed energy to stay as head of the 2014 World Cup organising committee. I will not be able to travel to 10 cities (in Brazil) to approve stadiums.”
FIFA issued a brief statement saying simply that it had “taken note of the formal resignation of Nicolas Leoz as a member of the executive committee and as president of CONMEBOL for health and personal reasons.
“In accordance with FIFA statutes CONMEBOL will now have to decide immediately on the replacement of Nicolas Leoz as one of its representatives on the executive committee.”
Leoz, who was due to remain president of the 10-nation CONMEBOL until 2015, adds his name to a growing list of scandal-tarnished executive committee members who have now either quit FIFA or been banned including Teixeira, Mohamed Bin Hammam and Jack Warner. Only last April he was declared ‘president for life’ of CONMEBOL.
Leoz’s resignation means almost half the old guard who decided in December 2010 on the hosts for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup finals have now left FIFA for one reason or another, some with their names unblemished but most because of corruption allegations.
An executive committee meeting of CONMEBOL has been summoned for next Tuesday when a successor to Leoz on the FIFA executive committee will be selected.
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