World Cup 2022: Here’s what we know about the investigation into alleged corruption during Qatar’s World Cup bid
Fifa's report into alleged corruption has been labelled a 'whitewash' after claiming Qatar has done nothing wrong in their bid campaign for the World Cup.
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Fifa's ethics committee's investigation in alleged corruption in awarding the 2022 World Cup to Qatar has claimed that there was no wrongdoing in the bid campaigns despite evidence suggesting otherwise.
The summary, released by German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert on Thursday 13th November, stated:
- The focus of the English bid was Concacaf (Central and North America region) president Jack Warner, from Trinidad and Tobago, who was “showering the England 2018 bid team with inappropriate requests”. Warner has since retired from football for life.
- Warner asked the FA/English team to help “a person of interest to him find a part-time job in the UK” – a request to which the English acquiesced
- The FA/English team were “willing” to provide “favours and benefits” for Warner’s “Joe Public Football Club” in Trinidad and Tobago
- The FA/English made “substantial assistance” to the UK training camp of a Trinidad and Tobago team during an Under-20s tournament in 2009
- Warner used his “considerable influence … to exact personal benefits in violation of the Fifa code of ethics”. The report finds the English/FA showed “a willingness, time and again, to meet such expectation”
- The FA/English sponsored a Concacaf dinner for $55,000 “in an effort to curry favour” with Warner
- There was memorandum of understanding between the FA/English with the Oceania Football Confederation’s now disgraced former president Reynald Temarii which suggested he would get “considerably preferential treatment” in allocating development funds
- There was criticism in the report of former FA chairman Lord Triesman who testified on corruption in the bidding process to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee of the House of Commons but refused to cooperate with the ethics committee investigation
- The report highlights “potentially problematic conduct of specific individuals” and “will take appropriate steps if it deems such measures appropriate and feasible”. However, as with all the bids, it finds that nothing the FA/English did was “suited to compromise the integrity of the … bidding process as a whole”.
The full report, carried out by American lawyer Michael Garcia, has been carried out after allegations of mass corruption during the bidding process of the two World Cup's in question.
Here at the main allegations that had been made regarding Qatar winning the rights to host the 2022 World Cup.
- Mohamed Bin Hammam was accused by The Sunday Times of paying more than £3m to football officials around the round to secure votes for Qatar to host the 2022 World Cup.
- The Sunday Times claimed to have seen millions of documents and e-mails detailing payments to officials in the Caribbean, Africa and the Pacific.
- Documents also alleged to show Bin Hammam was making payments to African officials to allegedly buy their support for Qatar in the 2022 World Cup bid.
- A separate Sunday Times investigation filmed Nigeria’s Amos Adamu and Tahiti’s Reynald Temarii allegedly appearing to discuss selling their votes in exchange for money, with the pair being suspended by Fifa, although they were later cleared.
- Bin Hammam was banned from all football-related activities for life after being accused of offering bribes to officials in return of support for his 2011 campaign to replace Sepp Blatter as Fifa president. He was cleared of the charges, but later banned for life on different “conflict of interest” charges relating to his time as Asian Football Confederation president.
- Bin Hammam alleged to have ran a network of 10 slush funds to make payments to 30 African football officials, with up to $1.6m paid to former Fifa vice-president Jack Warner.
- Temarii resigned after being reportedly caught on camera, but the Sunday Times accused Bin Hammam of paying his $300,000 legal fees to fight the corruption charges.
- According to the Sunday Times, this meant that the Oceania Football Confederation had no vote for the 2022 World Cup, with vice-president David Chung expected to have voted for Qatar’s rival Australia in Temarii’s absence.
The paper claimed that had the vice president David Chung been allowed to vote he would have supported Qatar's rivals Australia.
Temarri and Adamu were cleared of corruption, but received bans and fines from Fifa's ethics committee for failing to report the alleged approaches. Temarii is reportedly now suing the Sunday Times for defamation..
The Qatar Bid Committee has consistently denied any wrongdoing and previously has isssued a statement that “ Mohamed Bin Hammam played no official or unofficial role in Qatar’s 2022 Bid Committee. As was the case with every other member of FIFA’s Executive Committee, our bid team had to convince Mr. Bin Hammam of the merits of our bid.”
Mr Bin Hammam has strongly denied all the allegations against him.
Garcia, chairman of the investigatory chamber of the FIFA Ethics Committee, raised further questions of today's announcement after he labelled the summary as containing "numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions" that he has found in his report.
Garcia said in a statement: "Today's decision by the Chairman of the Adjudicatory Chamber contains numerous materially incomplete and erroneous representations of the facts and conclusions detailed in the Investigatory Chamber's report. I intend to appeal this decision to the FIFA Appeal Committee."
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