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Saturday, July 26, 2025

Fifa corruption: Documents show details of Jack Warner 'bribes'

by

20150607

Sto­ry by: Ed Thomas of the BBC

A BBC in­ves­ti­ga­tion has seen ev­i­dence that de­tails what hap­pened to the $10m sent from Fi­fa to ac­counts con­trolled by for­mer vice-pres­i­dent Jack Warn­er.

The mon­ey, sent on be­half of South Africa, was meant to be used for its Caribbean di­as­po­ra lega­cy pro­gramme.

But doc­u­ments sug­gest Mr Warn­er used the pay­ment for cash with­drawals, per­son­al loans and to laun­der mon­ey.

The 72-year-old, who has been in­dict­ed by the US FBI for cor­rup­tion, de­nies all claims of wrong­do­ing.

Fi­fa says it is co-op­er­at­ing with the in­ves­ti­ga­tion.

And­South Africa's Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion has is­sued a de­tailed state­ment­deny­ing any wrong­do­ing.

The pa­pers seen by the BBC de­tail three wire trans­fers by Fi­fa.

In the three trans­ac­tions - on 4 Jan­u­ary, 1 Feb­ru­ary and 10 March 2008 - funds to­talling $10m (�6.5m) from Fi­fa ac­counts were re­ceived in­to­Con­ca­cafac­counts con­trolled by Jack Warn­er.

At the time, he was in charge of the body, which gov­erns foot­ball in North and Cen­tral Amer­i­ca and the Caribbean.

Per­son­al pay­outs

The mon­ey had been promised by South Africa's Foot­ball As­so­ci­a­tion for its so-called di­as­po­ra lega­cy pro­gramme to de­vel­op foot­ball in the Caribbean.

The doc­u­ments de­tail ex­act­ly how and when the mon­ey was trans­ferred

The doc­u­ments re­veal how the mon­ey was spent and moved around.

JTA Su­per­mar­kets, a large chain in Trinidad, re­ceived $4,860,000 from the ac­counts.

The mon­ey was paid in in­stal­ments from Jan­u­ary 2008 to March 2009. The largest pay­ment was $1,350,000 paid in Feb­ru­ary 2008.

US pros­e­cu­tors say the mon­ey was most­ly paid back to Mr Warn­er in lo­cal cur­ren­cy.

Huge sums of mon­ey were used to pay off cred­it cards and per­son­al loans

Jack Warn­er: The US charge sheet

Ac­cused of rack­e­teer­ing, wire fraud, mon­ey laun­der­ing, bribery

From the ear­ly 1990s, he al­leged­ly "be­gan to lever­age his in­flu­ence and ex­ploit his of­fi­cial po­si­tions for per­son­al gain"

Al­leged­ly ac­cept­ed a $10m bribe from South African of­fi­cials in re­turn for vot­ing to award them the 2010 World Cup

Al­leged­ly bribed of­fi­cials with en­velopes each con­tain­ing $40,000 in cash; when one de­murred, he al­leged­ly said: "There are some peo­ple here who think they are more pi­ous than thou. If you're pi­ous, open a church, friends. Our busi­ness is our busi­ness"

Key ques­tions an­swered

Jack Warn­er: Con­tro­ver­sial ex-Fi­fa chief

Who are the in­dict­ed of­fi­cials?

Fi­fa in cri­sis - Spe­cial Re­ports

The BBC gave de­tails of its in­ves­ti­ga­tion to Brent San­cho, Trinidad and To­ba­go's sports min­is­ter and a for­mer foot­baller.

He said: "He [Mr Warn­er] must face jus­tice, he must an­swer all of these ques­tions. Jus­tice has to be served.

"He will have to ac­count, with this in­ves­ti­ga­tion, he will have to an­swer for his ac­tions."

The doc­u­ments al­so show $360,000 of the Fi­fa mon­ey was with­drawn by peo­ple con­nect­ed to Mr Warn­er.

A Trinidad su­per­mar­ket re­ceived al­most $5m

Near­ly $1.6m was used to pay the for­mer Fi­fa vice-pres­i­dent's cred­it cards and per­son­al loans.

The doc­u­ments show the largest per­son­al loan Mr Warn­er pro­vid­ed for him­self was $410,000.

The largest cred­it card pay­ment was $87,000.

Mr San­cho says he is now an­gry and dis­ap­point­ed.

"I'm dev­as­tat­ed be­cause a lot of that mon­ey should have been back in foot­ball, back in the de­vel­op­ment of chil­dren play­ing the sport.

"It is a trav­es­ty. Mr Warn­er should an­swer the ques­tions," he added.

'The gloves are off'

Jack Warn­er is one of 14 peo­ple charged by US pros­e­cu­tors over al­leged cor­rup­tion at Fi­fa.

The US Jus­tice de­part­ment al­leges the 14 ac­cept­ed bribes and kick­backs es­ti­mat­ed at more than $150m (�97m) over a 24-year pe­ri­od.

Mr Warn­er de­nies all charges of cor­rup­tion.

He re­signed from Fi­fa's ex­ec­u­tive com­mit­tee and all oth­er foot­ball com­mit­ments in 2011 amid al­le­ga­tions he had bribed his Caribbean as­so­ciates.

He lat­er stepped down as Trinidad and To­ba­go's se­cu­ri­ty min­is­ter amid a fraud in­quiry.

A key fig­ure in the deep­en­ing scan­dal, in a re­cent state­ment he said he had giv­en lawyers doc­u­ments out­lin­ing the links be­tween Fi­fa, its fund­ing, him­self and the 2010 elec­tion in Trinidad and To­ba­go. He said the trans­ac­tions al­so in­clud­ed Mr Blat­ter.

"I will no longer keep se­crets for them who ac­tive­ly seek to de­stroy the coun­try," he said in an ad­dress on Trinida­di­an TV last week en­ti­tled "The gloves are off".

Speak­ing to his sup­port­ers at a ral­ly lat­er the same day, he promised an "avalanche" of rev­e­la­tions to come.

Mr Warn­er, who faces ex­tra­di­tion to the US, was re­leased on bail af­ter hand­ing him­self in to po­lice in the Trinidad and To­ba­go cap­i­tal Port of Spain last week.

He says he is an in­no­cent scape­goat who will­soon re­veal the truth of what hap­pened in­side Fi­fa.

The an­nounce­ment of the FBI charges in late May has dri­ven Fi­fa in­to its great­est cri­sis; last week its pres­i­dent, Sepp Blat­ter an­nounced he was step­ping down, on­ly days af­ter be­ing re-elect­ed to a fifth term.

Ad­di­tion­al re­port­ing by Ash­ley Sem­ler and Pe­ter Mur­taugh.

Sto­ry cour­tesy of the BBC


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