By Andrew Warshaw
November 3 – Thailand’s Worawi Makudi is edging closer to becoming the latest FIFA powerbroker to face possible scandal despite denying he used development funds for his own purposes.
Allegations persist that Thailand’s national football training centre, built with money from FIFA’s GOAL programme and which UEFA President Michel Platini laid the first stone, was on a plot of land personally owned by Makudi, and that he owns other land around the centre.
Makudi insists he signed over the land to the Football Association of Thailand (FAT) – of which he happens to be chairman – but FIFA remains unconvinced and has given Makudi a deadline of December 1 to provide proof that he did not misuse $860,000 of GOAL funds.
Makudi is known to be a close ally of Mohamed Bin Hammam, who was banned for life in July by FIFA’s Ethics Committee in cash-for-votes scandal.
Interestingly, Bin Hammam, who is still appealing his sentence, was head of the GOAL programme until being thrown out by FIFA.
A FIFA statement said: “After an in depth analysis of the documentation received so far, FIFA still considers further confirmation is required from Mr Makudi that the land has legally been donated to the Thai FA and that this donation is effective.
“FIFA has therefore asked Mr Makudi to provide by 1 December 2011 the legal provisions and documentation that would confirm this donation of land.
“Should FIFA not receive the requested legal confirmation by that date, the matter would be referred to the Ethics Committee.”
The allegations, which first appeared in a Swiss newspaper, refer to an artificial football pitch and new headquarters for the Thai FA.
Funding for both came from GOAL, one of FIFA president Sepp Blatter’s personal success stories, providing money to help less wealthy national associations that lack the resources to develop the game.
Blatter, who set up GOAL in 1999 and recently launched his eagerly awaited anti-corruption drive, will be anxious not to allow Makudi – a member of FIFA’s Executive Committee for 14 years – to go unpunished if he has broken FIFA’s strict code of ethics.
If investigated, Makudi would be the sixth senior FiFA executive to face an Ethics hearing since October last year.
According to reports he sent 30 pages of land registration documents to the Zurich offices of FIFA last month in a bid to clear his name.
He told the Thai media he was ”disappointed” that FIFA did not accept his initial set of documents.
”Their failure to do so has tainted my reputation,” Makudi said at the time.
However, section 5 of FIFA’s code of ethics reads: “While performing their duties, officials shall avoid any situation that could lead to conflicts of interest.
“Conflicts of interest arise if officials have, or appear to have, private or personal interests that detract from their ability to perform their duties as officials with integrity in an independent and purposeful manner.
“Private or personal interests include gaining any possible advantage for himself, his family, relatives, friends and acquaintances.”
In May, Lord Triesman, the former Football Association chairman, alleged to a Parliamentary committee that Makudi had demanded the television rights for a proposed friendly game between England and Thailand in return for his World Cup 2018 vote.
Makudi denied it and Triesman’s claims could find no further evidence to support them.
To add even more intrigue to the case, Makudi is a director of the Manchester-based firm Makudi Investments Ltd.
Its classification?
The “buying and selling of own real estate”.
Contact the writer of this story at zib.l1734842905labto1734842905ofdlr1734842905owedi1734842905sni@w1734842905ahsra1734842905w.wer1734842905dna1734842905
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