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Blatter & Havelange named in Swiss
bribes trial
Those offshore accounts had some pretty names; Nunca, Sunbow, Taora and now . . . Sicuretta. ISL wired £3 million and Jean-Marie removed it in traditional suitcases of cash, sometimes more than £500,000 a time – and won’t say who he bunged. All he would ever admit, as the Zug investigators flourished the thumbscrews over the months, was that it was cash for ‘the acquisition of rights.’
In an off-hand comment to investigators, and quoted in the Indictment, a Liechtenstein lawyer Guido Renggli who managed the Sicuretta account and doled out the bundles of readies, remembered being taken to Paris in 1998 by Jean-Marie to meet the newly-elected FIFA president Blatter.
OK, said Judge Siegwart, I want to know who got the money? Five of the Six insisted they had no idea. Like us at the press tables they knew the names of all the top decision-makers in world sport – and there’s not that many of them – but they didn’t know who had taken their money. Hadn’t a clue.
The man who distributed the goodies, Jean-Marie Weber, is the fourth stooge in the line-up in front of us and Jean-Marie knows everything. He was once Horst Dassler’s assistant and took over delivering the bungs when Dassler died. His job description at ISL was ‘cultivating relationships’ and he carried his two black briefcases around the world, stuffed full of these private agreements to kickback.
For years Jean-Marie’s tall frame and bouffant silver hair has towered above every FIFA meeting and the congresses of other wealthy sports. Today he’s looking scrawny, his voice is reedy and his hair suddenly cut short, is he hoping to avoid the prison barber?
Judge Siegwart asks him, who got the money and Jean-Marie begins the mantra we hear repeated through the rest of the morning, ‘On the advice of my lawyer I have no statement to make. My lawyer will address these matters.’ At other times he says ‘these payments were confidential and I must respect that confidentiality.’
Siegwart’s getting testy. These clowns are taking the piss. He fixes on a modest kickback, only $250,000, the Indictment says it went to a Mr Abdul Muttaleb of Kuwait. When it was paid in 2000 he was Director General of the Olympic Council for Asia. And yes, ISL obtained a contract with the OCA. In 2004 the BBC’s Panorama programme caught Muttaleb discussing how bribes could be paid to his friends on the International Olympic Committee. End of the big earners for Abdul.
Why have you paid so much money to that person in Kuwait, demands the Judge. Here, we have to show our companies and tax officials documents for every meal we have with business partners – and you give away $250,000 without any notice, any documentation, any contract, any memo, any letter?
The certificated accountant Schmid re-states. ‘We wouldn’t get any receipt from those persons.’
Next for shaming is FIFA executive committee member Nicolas Leoz. The fact that he trousered $130,000 from ISL was leaked to a London newspaper in the autumn of 2006; damage limitation when this trial seemed imminent. It’s surprising that there’s no other evidence today of payments to Leoz. He’s been the president of CONMEBOL, the South American federation forever and if votes were being bought, his was a thirst that would need barrels of champagne. The Six have nothing useful to contribute about Leoz. The Judges’ scowls lengthen.
Siegwart’s had enough. He pulls a hand grenade from the files on his desk, flips the pin and rolls it across the courtroom floor.
When our ears stop ringing we realise what he’s said; he’s got evidence that in the previous decade they’d paid out – wait for it, hold tight – a stunning £60 million in bribes. That’s on top of the £9 million on the charge sheet. No wonder ISL dipped south, never to return.
Judge Siegwart tries yet again for names. Malms says he doesn’t know them - but that a handful of reporters do. And Yes! Jean-Francois Tanda from Zurich, Jens Weinreich from Berlin, Thomas Kistner from Munich and I grin at each other. But Jean-Marie doesn’t say. The others repeat their mantra, only Jean-Marie knows.
The hearing ended at 11.20. The lawyers will be back on March 31 to submit their arguments and verdicts are expected in three months. We went away to think about the wider implications of the evidence.