By Andrew Warshaw in Zurich
May 28 – Accusing FIFA of indulging for two generations in a “World Cup of Fraud”, US justice authorities today laid bare the full and sensational extent of corruption at the heart of football’s world governing body in the Americas. Those indicted by the US authorities are accused of accepting bribes and kickbacks estimated at more than $150m over a 24-year period.
On the day when seven senior football officials, most notably FIFA vice-president Jeffrey Webb, were arrested in Zurich as part of a painstaking US-led investigation, US attorney general Loretta E. Lynch (pictured) presented stunning evidence of criminal activity that involved not only multi-million dollar marketing deals but also hugely damaging criminal activity surrounding the 2010 World Cup.
At the top of the list of a remarkable 47-count indictment from the Lynch’s office against 14 FIFA officials – including the seven arrested in Zurich – was the charge that South Africa paid $10 million in bribes to secure the 2010 tournament – cash that was transferred via a FIFA account.
The money was paid to disgraced former FIFA powerbrokers Jack Warner and Chuck Blazer who ran CONCACAF as president and general secretary respectively until their worlds came tumbling down amid accusations of bribery and money laundering. A separate cash payment in $10,000 stacks was collected from a hotel room in Paris from a high-ranking South African bid committee official, the indictment says.
It adds Warner was offered $1 million by South Africa’s rival bid Morocco but that Blazer “learned from Jack Warner that high-ranking officials of FIFA, the South African government, and the South African bid committee, were prepared to arrange for the government of South Africa to pay $10 million to “support the African diaspora”.
Blazer “understood the offer to be in exchange for World Cup votes but later “learned that the South Africans were unable to arrange for the payment to be made directly from government funds”. Blazer was to personally benefit to the tune of 1million dollars.
The indictment adds: “Arrangements were thereafter made with FIFA officials to instead have the $10 million sent from FIFA – using funds that would otherwise have gone from FIFA to South Africa to support the World Cup – to CFU [Caribbean Football Union].
“In fact, on January 2, 2008, January 31, 2008 and March 7, 2008, a high-ranking FIFA official caused payments… totalling $10 million – to be wired from a FIFA account in Switzerland to a Bank of America correspondent account in New York… controlled by Jack Warner.”
To stunned amazement among reporters attending a news conference in Brooklyn that rounded off the most dramatic day in the history of football politics, Lynch added: “The criminal activity we have identified did not solely involve sports marketing. Around 2004, bidding began for the opportunity to host the 2010 World Cup, which was ultimately awarded to South Africa – the first time the tournament would be held on the African continent. But even for this historic event, FIFA executives and others corrupted the process by using bribes to influence the hosting decision.
“The indictment also alleges that corruption and bribery extended to the 2011 FIFA presidential election (regarding Mohamed bin Hammam), and to agreements regarding sponsorship of the Brazilian national soccer team by a major U.S. sportswear company.”
Lynch reserved particular criticism for CONCACAF and CONMEBOL.
“Beginning in 1991 two generations of soccer officials including the then president of CONCACAF (Warner) and the South American football confederation CONMEBOL (Nicolas Leoz) used their positions of trust to solicit bribes from sports markeers in exchange for the commercial rights to their tournaments,” she charged. “They did this time after time, year after year, tournament after tournament.”
Her attack on FIFA officials past and present, which can only be described as a conspiracy of corruption, came as the Swiss justice authorities announced that six of the seven officials arrested at their hotel had refused extradition.
After she had spoken, Richard Weber of the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigation department added: “This is the World Cup of fraud. Today we are issuing FIFA with a red card.”
The allegations against current CONCACAF president Webb, whose public image since taking over from Warner a couple of years ago was one of an honourable man doing his best to clean up football but whose reputation is now in tatters, were described by FBI director James B Comey .
“He used his position in the various roles to solicit and collect bribes from sports marketing executives who needed his support to get contracts for tournaments,” said Comey.
Investigators, he said, “will not stop” until the message is sent “that this is not the way things should be. If you touch our shores with your corrupt enterprise you will be held accountable for that corruption. Nobody is above or beyond the law.”
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