Three Fifa officials accused

WORLD CUP BIDDING:THREE OF the Fifa executive committee members who will decide the fate of the 2018 World Cup were last night accused of taking bribes in a corruption scandal involving around $100 million (€64.2 million) of secret payments.

The BBC's Panoramadocumentary, the timing of which had been branded "unpatriotic" by bid executives before broadcast and "frustrating" by the British prime minister, David Cameron, also contained fresh allegations against the Concacaf president, Jack Warner, concerning a ticketing scandal linked to the 2010 World Cup.

Warner, and the three votes he controls, are seen as key to England’s hopes of progressing beyond the first round and the bid’s “three lions” – as the chief executive, Andy Anson, called them – in Prince William, David Beckham and Cameron will be called upon to try to limit the damage. Cameron will arrive in Zurich today and is expected to meet Warner, who has been scathing in his criticism of the BBC documentary.

Critics of the timing of the programme last night insisted the strength and topicality of the new allegations did not justify broadcasting it three days before the vote – particularly as the claims had nothing to do with the bidding process.

Warner, embroiled in an earlier ticketing scandal at the 2006 World Cup, was last night alleged to have ordered tickets costing €64,000 from the Fifa ticket office for the 2010 tournament but that the deal fell through.

On the back of the Sunday Times investigation that led to the suspension of six Fifa officials but created a climate of suspicion among the electorate, the Panorama allegations are likely to lead to further hostility against the British media.

The claims will lead to renewed calls for Fifa to answer outstanding questions over the ISL affair, which triggered one of Switzerland’s biggest criminal fraud cases, and justify the continued presence of the individuals concerned on its executive committee.

One of the three, Cameroon’s Issa Hayatou, who has never been named before in connection with the affair, appears on a detailed list of 175 alleged secret payments, made betweeen 1989 and 1999, from the now defunct sports marketing company International Sports and Leisure routed via a series of front companies in Liechtenstein to top Fifa officials.

Hayatou, once seen as a key target for England, was understood to have reacted furiously to the earlier Sunday Times investigation and the three-year suspension handed down to Adamu.

The Paraguayan head of the South American football federation, Nicolas Leoz, also on the list, was named in connection with two International Sports and Leisure payments totalling €98,500 during court proceedings in 2008 but Panorama alleged that he received three further payments of €152, 000 each.

He was lobbied only last week by the England bid team.

The payments list shows that a Liechtenstein company, Sanud, received €7.2 million.

Ricardo Teixeira, head of the Brazilian Football Confederation, the third executive member named, was linked to Sanud by a 2001 Brazilian Senate investigation which found it had secretly channelled money to him.

Six International Sports and Leisure managers were tried in 2008 for misusing company money, but they were not tried for commercial bribery as it was not an offence in Switzerland until 2001.

The Fifa president, Sepp Blatter, already under fire over the opaque bidding process, declined to comment on the three Fifa executives alleged to have taken bribes.

The global sports rights agency was declared bankrupt in May 2001 but the fallout continued until June this year, when the second of two Swiss court cases ended with an agreement to pay a €4.1 million to settle the case anonymously. At the time Fifa said: “It is important to recall that the decision was made on matters which took place prior to the year 2000 and that there has been no court conviction against Fifa. In addition, the Fifa president has been cleared of any wrongdoing in this matter.”

Fifa refused to comment last night.

BBC insiders said that there was a strong public interest rationale in showing the film before the vote took place and that they had been editing it right up until the last minute, having acquired the key document only in recent weeks. A spokesman said: “The programme is in the public interest and shows that some Fifa executives involved in making decisions about the 2018 bid have a history of taking bribes and that Fifa has consistently failed to act.”

Anson insisted although England were “underdogs” he remained confident that there was a credible “path to victory” as the last-minute lobbying intensified.

He reiterated his concerns about Panorama. “Of course I’m disappointed with the timing and it’s certainly not going to win any votes,” he said. “It’s a reality, it’s a small group of 23 people; in a way it’s a brotherhood of executive committee members. If you hurt one of them, of course it has an impact on the others. That’s just inevitable. I don’t think that we are going to be derailed by it, we just have to be aware of the implications and act accordingly.”

Guardian Service