US$10m graft payment: FIFA defends Valcke
Print Edition
FIFA yesterday admitted that it had processed a US$10 million payment from South Africa to a disgraced football official but denied that the world body’s secretary general Jerome Valcke was involved.
FIFA said a former finance committee chief who died last year, Argentine Julio Grondona, authorized the payment which went to Jack Warner.
Warner, one of 14 people facing corruption charges in the United States over US$150 million in bribes, was at the time Grondona’s deputy as head of FIFA’s finance committee.
The South African government asked FIFA to “withhold” money intended for the organizers of the 2010 World Cup and send it to a development project in the Caribbean run by Warner, a FIFA statement said.
According to US investigators, the US$10 million was a bribe promised to Warner and his deputy Chuck Blazer to secure the 2010 World Cup. South Africa has strongly denied any wrongdoing.
The FIFA statement came in response to a New York Times report that Valcke, right hand man to FIFA president Sepp Blatter had approved the payment to an account controlled by Warner, then head of the North and Central American and Caribbean confederation.
The New York Times, citing unnamed law enforcement officials, said the payments are a crucial part of the indictment against the 14 football officials and marketing executives.
FIFA said it had acted as an intermediary between South Africa and a World Cup legacy project to “support the African diaspora in the Caribbean”.
A FIFA statement said neither Valcke “nor any other member of FIFA’s senior management were involved in the initiation, approval and implementation” of the transfer.
Valcke on Monday announced that he had called off a planned visit to Canada next week for the start of the Women’s World Cup.
Swiss police, following a US request, arrested seven FIFA officials in Zurich two days before Blatter was reelected as president on Friday. He has expressed doubts about the raid.
But the corruption scandal has since spread with authorities in several countries launching investigations.
Brazilian prosecutors have launched an investigation into Ricardo Teixeira, former Brazilian football confederation chief, for money-laundering and fraud, officials said.
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