FIFA in fresh turmoil as explosive letter blows apart claims that Sepp Blatter’s No 2 Jerome Valcke did NOT know about $10m payment at centre of FBI probe.
FIFA are in fresh turmoil after their denial that general secretary Jerome Valcke signed off a $10million payment to Jack Warner was exposed by an explosive letter.
In a email sent on Tuesday morning, FIFA claimed that deceased Julio Grondona, the former finance chief of the organisation and a long-time ally of president Sepp Blatter, was the person who authorised the payment that is at the heart of the bribery scandal.
But an hour later, a letter from the South African Football Association appeared to blow apart those claims.
The payment followed a letter from South African FA president Molefi Oliphant to Valcke asking for the payment to be withheld from World Cup funds and paid instead to Warner to support football in the Caribbean.
The payment is at the heart of the FIFA bribery scandal – a US justice department indictment of 18 people on corruption charges says the money was paid to Warner and his deputy Chuck Blazer in return for them voting for the 2010 World Cup to be played in South Africa.
A FIFA statement said Valcke was not involved, but that the payment was made at the request of the South African government and FA, and authorised by Grondona, who died last year.
The letter contains detailed instructions for the payment.
According to the US indictment, the money was siphoned off into Warner’s personal accounts and he paid $750,000 of a promised 1million to Blazer.
FIFA insisted Valcke nor any other senior management figure was involved.
A previous FIFA statement said: ‘The payments totalling USD 10m were authorised by the then chairman of the Finance Committee and executed in accordance with the organisation regulations of FIFA. FIFA did not incur any costs as a result of South Africa’s request because the funds belonged to the LOC. Both the LOC and SAFA adhered to the necessary formalities for the budgetary amendment.
‘Neither the Secretary General Jerome Valcke nor any other member of FIFA’s senior management were involved in the initiation, approval and implementation of the above project.’
FIFA maintained that earlier stance in a statement responding to the letter, saying: ‘The letter is consistent to our statement where we underlined that the FIFA Finance Committee made the final approval.’
FIFA Scandal: New letter reveals Jerome Valcke knew about $10m payment from South African government…..
– dailymail