FIFA World Cup Corruption Shock!

[kinboshi]

Fifa is facing fresh allegations of corruption over its controversial decision to award the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.

The Sunday Times  has obtained millions of secret documents - emails, letters and bank transfers - which it alleges are proof that the disgraced Qatari football official Mohamed Bin Hammam made payments totalling US$5m (£3m) to football officials in return for their support for the Qatar bid.

Qatar 2022 and Bin Hammam have always strenuously denied the former Fifa vice-president actively lobbied on their behalf in the run-up to the vote in December 2010.

But, according to emails obtained by the Sunday Times and seen by the BBC, it is now clear that Bin Hammam, 65, was lobbying on his country's behalf at least a year before the decision.

The documents also show how Bin Hammam was making payments directly to football officials in Africa to allegedly buy their support for Qatar in the contest.

Qatar strongly denies any wrongdoing and insists that Bin Hammam never had any official role supporting the bid and always acted independently from the Qatar 2022 campaign.

When approached by the Sunday Times to respond to their claims, Bin Hammam's son Hamad Al Abdulla declined to comment on his behalf.

Although the vast majority of the officials did not have a vote, the Sunday Times alleges Bin Hammam's strategy was to win a groundswell of support for the Qatari bid which would then influence the four African Fifa executive committee members who were able to take part in the election.

The Sunday Times also alleges that it has documents which prove Bin Hammam paid 305,000 Euros (£250,000) to cover the legal expenses of another former Fifa executive committee member from Oceania, Reynald Temarii.

Temarii, from Tahiti, was unable to vote in the contest as he had already been suspended by Fifa after he was caught out by a Sunday Times sting asking bogus American bid officials for money in return for his support.

But the paper now alleges that Bin Hammam provided him with financial assistance to allow him to appeal against the Fifa suspension, delaying his removal from the executive committee and blocking his deputy David Chung from voting in the 2022 election.

The paper claims that had Chung been allowed to vote he would have supported Qatar's rivals Australia. Instead there was no representative from Oceania allowed to vote, a decision which may have influenced the outcome in Qatar's favour.

The paper also makes fresh allegations about the relationship between Bin Hammam and his disgraced Fifa ally Jack Warner, from Trinidad.

Although Warner was forced to resign as a Fifa vice-president in 2011, after it was proved he helped Bin Hammam bribe Caribbean football officials in return for their support in his bid to oust the long-standing Fifa president Sepp Blatter, the paper says it has evidence which shows more than $1.6m was paid by Bin Hammam to Warner, including $450,000 in the period before the vote.

The new allegations will place Fifa under fresh pressure to re-run the vote for the 2022 World Cup, which was held in conjunction with the vote for the 2018 tournament, in which England were eliminated in the first round with just two votes.

Fifa's chief investigator Michael Garcia is already conducting a long-running inquiry into allegations of corruption and wrongdoing during the 2018/22 decisions. He is due to meet senior officials from the Qatar 2022 organising committee in Oman on Monday.

But that meeting may now have to be postponed in light of the Sunday Times revelations which have raised important new questions about the link between Bin Hammam and the successful Qatari World Cup campaign.

So obviously these 'allegations' won't come as a shock to many, but it really does highlight what a joke the decision to choose Qatar was (and Blatter's casual admission that they made a mistake by not noticing that it's a bit warm there in the summer for a start), and how the sole consideration for the decision was money.

The question is what will/should/would you like to happen?

[Ironside]

Just give it to England after all they got 2 votes for 2018 and only bribed one country

[Waz1892]

Fifa needs an indenpendant root review of its board members and following this, Blatter should on prinicpal resign or be told to step down.

They have, or at least give the impression, little interest in the game itself and it comes across very much so as a job for boys club.

The alleged bribary is a scourge of our beautiful game.

Review of the voting system, remove the cloak and dagger stuff. The whole organisation is a joke.

The biggest crime though is we all know its a joke
The majority of clubs and assoications around the world have little confidence in its structure and management
Yet nothing will happen nothing will change.

They'll annouce a revote for sure over time, but not because of the alleged bribary, but they'll spin it as weather reasons etc. it'll get swept under the carpet, as they'll all look after eacj othet behind closed doors.

Any other "business" run like this would be torn apart.

[mulhuzz]

Nothing will happen but I'd like to see it go to Australia.

Blatter surely can't stand this.

Except he will, as he has no decency or moral centre.

[Skippy]

It's too clever really- they get to say it was all corrupt, sack a couple of people they didn't like, keep Qatar's money, have a reelection and then collect a whole new set of bribes. Brilliant!

[kinboshi]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/29285817

[horseplayer]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/29285817

And he has paid the value of the watch to charity.

Talksports Mike Parry is a bit of an idiot but said something interesting in the week. When he was in South Africa for the world cup for talksport they all got a gift bag that he never opened. He found it recently got the watch valued and it was well past the £1000 mark.

[kinboshi]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/29285817

And he has paid the value of the watch to charity.

Talksports Mike Parry is a bit of an idiot but said something interesting in the week. When he was in South Africa for the world cup for talksport they all got a gift bag that he never opened. He found it recently got the watch valued and it was well past the £1000 mark.

No he hasn't:

"I'm going to ask for the value of this watch and I'm going to give to a charitable organisation, a foundation, this value. But I can't return a gift. In my upbringing, I cannot return gifts like that."

[kinboshi]

FIFA

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30037729

The findings of Fifa's inquiry into allegations of corruption during bidding for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups have been questioned - by the man who conducted the two-year investigation into the claims.

Lawyer Michael Garcia says a report issued by Fifa on Thursday "contains numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions".

FIFA covering up a cover up...

[DungBeetle]

Amazing!  FIFA will just be laughed out of the room.  Their credibility is zero.  Not that they care I suppose. 

[kinboshi]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30015096

Eckert responded: "I'm surprised, not shocked. I'm a long time in the job here, I don't think anything surprises me."

[mickyw78]

It's unreal really

[rfgqqabc]

Abandon fifa for a new organization that will hopefully be a bit better. Need to cull the lot.

[kinboshi]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30103293

If you made this up for a work of fiction, people would say that it's too far-fetched and unrealistic.

[kinboshi]

Unbelievable:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/30122601