Lord T (the man who got his title for being there and doing things for government) told the select committee of the British Parliament that is taking a peek under the carpet of football and pulling out all the mucky bits, that the Fifa vice-president Jack Warner asked for around £2.5m to build an education centre in Trinidad with the cash going via his handbag. He also wanted £500,000 to buy Haiti’s World Cup TV rights. Oh yes and just for simplicity he also wants that to go via himself. Just for safety’s sake.
Did we hear of this at the time? No. Were the fraud squad told? Did it make world news? No, because Lord T thought we might win the bid. Corruption at the heart of British government as well as at the heart of football.
The man from Paraguay, Nicolás Leoz, wanted a knighthood (saying that Lord T, as a man who had got the freebies out of the British government himself with his peerage, ought to know how these things work.
The man from Brazil, Ricardo Teixeira, asked Lord Turnip, sorry Triesman to “come and tell me what you have got for me”.
The man from Thailand’s, Woraw Makudi, wanted the TV rights to a friendly between England and the Thai national team. Personally.
The prime minister didn’t really want to know. He said, “Ultimately, Fifa are the world governing body of football and it is for them, if need be, to do the things that they need to do to put their house in order. Clearly they need to reassure the sporting public and fans that there is no suggestion of corruption or any problems with competition for these kinds of major sporting events.”
So how did our FA get so mired in the dirt. Come to that, we had a Prince in there too. And a new prime minister. Mind you the PM was used to giving out knighthoods and peerages so maybe he thought the request was just the normal run of the mill.
As it is in sport. Juan Antonio Samaranch, former president of the International Olympic Committee, was given Spain’s Collar of the Order of Isabella the Catholic, Ukraine’s Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, and the Order of the White Double Cross, First Class, from Slovakia – at least according to the Guardian, who know about this stuff.
Quite clearly the desire to cover up corruption goes to the very top of football in the country – just as it does in politics.
Untold Arsenal on Twitter is in the top 1% of all Twitter sites for followers @UntoldArsenal
Untold Arsenal on Facebook here
History of Arsenal with a new series on the Rioch year, comparing that with the current team.
Making the Arsenal – the book of Arsenal death and rebirth
Great article Tony.
When there is money involved there is corruption. When there is big money involved there is big corruption.
This is just the way the world is going. A very sad way.
I wonder if we ever get to find out how much money was actually paid by the winners of the bids to all those people….
The only thing we can do is to highlight those corrupt people and fifa/uefa. Because do you really think that uefa is totaly different story from fifa and never has heard of corruption?
Depressing 🙁
In the light of these disclosures, surely the answer must be our immediate departure from FIFA and its sphere of influence.
All we need now are men of integrity, power and nerve to step forward.
Why are we waiting?
@nicky
Yes, pulling-out of FIFA would be a very powerful step.
However, I can’t imagine what the consequences might be if that were ever to happen…!
@Tony: bravo! the power of connecting the dots that lead to the doorstep “that shall not be trespassed”! Gotta love that Order of the White Double Cross. Perhaps just The Double Cross and we have the title that the anointed one, Don Fergus, will receive on the occasion of the 19th, after most of the chips were called in. And yet, Tony, you suggest there’s Gambling in Casa Blanca? I, for one, am “shocked”! “shocked I say”! (Cheers!)
p.s. If only we had a Lord T amongst the Judas Crowd in the Hives of Riley. A Judas (in the making) amongst the Judases who came clean about the Bent-Refdumb. Our Judas, so to speak. Ah well, a girl can dream…
p.p.s. C’mon Howard (weaves a) Webb, become a true immortal. Cross over from the Dark Side and spill da beans… Then again, until that blessed day, and before the pendulum swings back and karma restores the justice we strive for, many of us hereabouts eagerly await Walter’s analysis of the Webb-Weaver’s body of work at Old Trafford on Black Sunday last.
@Walter: UEFA, you say?! Well, their Judas, MORONO, did name 4 referees, named them, as being bent. Yes he’s Morono, the Dark One, and he does connect the dots to the very threshold from whence the order came down that docks him five games. But credit where it’s due. For his reasons, he does spill 4 beans that are grist for the mill of the Un-Bent!
@nicky
What would pulling out of FIFA achieve for English football? Moreover, how would it stop the corruption within the FA and Premier League that has also indirectly come out? Pulling out or shutting your eyes to it is no solution really. The parliament should be forced to look into all aspects of football in the country and clean the game up, in full view of the public. That isn’t a guarantee of success (since Parliament and politicians aren’t the cleanest themselves) but it is all I can think of.
It’s ok – FIFA have bunged Interpol, synchronisity… obviously.
http://www.fifa.com/aboutfifa/federation/administration/releases/newsid=1431884.html
Move along now, nothing to see here…
It,s already been alluded to by William Galliard FIFA,s diector
of communications,rampant corruption,bribery,favoritism etc.in
the English Premier League but elsewhere too ,Spain ,Italy,Portu
gal,what,s new ?
We’re also signatories on a UEFA document supporting Blatter’s presidency………
Wait, what?
Why would we ever do that? Grow a pair, FA
@A Casual Observer
Good grief! :-0
Dealing with the FA is like worshipping a capricious god. You have no idea what it is going to do or why, what it will consider before making a decision or whether it will hear you at all. In fact you are unsure if it even exists.
man its dead in here, you should come over to the other page – we got a real humdinger going on there
Excellent Article Tony.
The question I have though is this!
If there is such corruption in the bids and votes for the world cup. Is there also corruption in the qualifiers and group selections and Refing of matches at which point do you decide is it even worth playing in.
Its frightening really…..
Red Gooner, you ask some good some very good questions.
These FIFA execs must of felt comfortable to broach Lord Triesman with the ideas for a reason. I wonder if the FA have ever complied with FIFA bribary requests before.
What is sad about the whole thing is that FIFA, UEFA & The FA seem untouchable. There doesn’t seem to be a clear way for the average football fan to object or raise their concerns with their national governments in a direct or meaningful way. I can see the situation getting worse and the cheating and bribery in football becoming more obvious and deep rooted.
Like I said sad.
Gooner Gal, I think you would be right in saying that we also possibly have been involved in shady dealings over the years for world cup bids.
Everyone knows whats going on even the average soccer supporter on the street so to say that the England bid team didnt would be just naive.
If we are going to bring this up now and highlight the issues in FIFA and world football it is NOT enough to hand it back to sebb blatter and let him deal with it They must push for criminal investigations and highlight also what sebb blatter got out of all of this even if it means the end of how world footbal is ran.
Because if people where getting paid for votes just imagine what blatter got paid for making sure all this came off.
Most amusing some delegate apparently asked for a knighthood. Still I can think of a few British knights who probably deserved one as much as this guy did, although the fifa delegate is probably far less corrupt than some of our own sirs.
Away from anything corrupt once heard a whisper wenger turned down a kbe??
Well, what goes around comes around. I guess there have been some benefits that Lord T must have enjoyed from FIFA in time past as the FA Chairman.
This is where care needs to be taken as he has been part of this organization in the past and he’s very aware of some of the underhand dealings from experience. He only needs to be careful as he who lives in a glass house must not start throwing stones at others. I see the public emerging as winners in this case as a lot would be spilled in the coming weeks