FIVE Fifa vice-presidents began legal action against beleaguered Fifa president Sepp Blatter in Zurich on Friday.
The five, led by European soccer chief Lennart Johansson, president of UEFA, said in an official communique they had reason to believe Blatter had been involved in ‘various criminal offences’.
They also accused him of using Fifa money to buy votes in a bid to remain in power.
Blatter is standing for another four years when the presidential election is held on May 29 in Seoul. He is being opposed by Fifa vice-president and head of the African Football Confederation (Caf) Issa Hayatou.
The law action was sparked by a confidential report delivered by Fifa secretary general Michel Zen-Ruffinen last week in Zurich.
In the most explosive document ever delivered to a Fifa ruling executive committee, Zen-Ruffinen outlined allegations of a trail of deception, mismanagement, illegal payments and cronyism against the 66-year-old Blatter.
”We take no pleasure in proceeding this way but as members of the controlling body of Fifa we have a legal responsibility to the Fifa member associations and a possible personal liability which requires us to act,” said the statement, signed by Johansson, David Will, Chung Mong-Joon, Hatatou and Antonio Matarrese.
”The report (by Zen Ruffinen) has shown numerous irregularities which exist within Fifa and various non-constitutional decisions taken by the Fifa president, some of which may constitute criminal acts under the Swiss penal code.
”We are also led to believe that some of the money spent by the Fifa president was used to secure the vote of some national associations and it is therefore likely that the president illegally tried to influence the result of the present presidential campaign,” said the official communique.
”The refusal of the Fifa president to resign his post, despite the evidence before the executive committee, left us no choice but to retain the services of a Swiss law firm.
”We have now been advised that the facts brought forward by the Fifa general secretary most likely do constitute various criminal offences and that we are obliged to refer these to the appropriate authorities,” added the five.
In Zen Ruffinen’s report, stamped ‘strictly confidential’, the secretary general revealed a secret presidential group within football’s governing world body that is answerable only to Blatter, in contravention to the Fifa statutes.
The most damning indictment against Blatter came at the end of the file where Zen-Ruffinen delivered two accusations, one which he said constituted a criminal act under the Swiss Penal Code and the second which ‘may’ constitute a criminal offence.
The first allegation claimed that Blatter paid executive committee member Adrian Wickham of the Solomon Islands, who was elected in 2000, two years backdated remuneration to 1998 of $100 000.
The second charge was over a payment to former Niger referee Lucien Bouchardeau for giving evidence against CAF vice-president Farah Addo, who in March accused Blatter supporters of bribing Fifa members to vote for him in the 1998 presidential election in Paris.
”The president handed out to him in front of two Fifa employees a cheque of $25 000 mentioning that Bouchardeau would receive additional $25 000 if the information he provided would suit the purpose of the president,” said Zen-Ruffinen in his report.
The secretary general also produced a damning indictment of Fifa vice-president Jack Warner of Trinidad, a staunch Blatter supporter.
”The president has constantly taken decisions which are favourable to the economical interests of Jack Warner and some of his family members, and thus are contrary to the financial interests of Fifa,” said Zen-Ruffinen.
Zen-Ruffinen claimed Fifa overpaid one of Warner’s sons over one million US dollars for an internet project.
But more damagingly, he said Warner paid only a symbolic one dollar for the World Cup television rights in the Caribbean for 1990/94 and 1998. – Sapa-AFP