Civil war at FIFA now, Warner opens the box...

[El Presidente]

It's a real nest of vipers now

Suspended Fifa vice-president Jack Warner has made public an e-mail that claims Mohamed Bin Hammam "bought" the 2022 World Cup finals for Qatar.

The e-mail, seemingly from Fifa general secretary Jerome Valcke, also questions why Asian confederation chief Bin Hammam was running for Fifa president.

Valcke wrote: "[Hammam] thought you can buy Fifa as they bought the World Cup".

Fifa suspended Warner and Bin Hammam over separate allegations of bribery, pending further investigation.

Bin Hammam was suspended by the organisation's ethics committee a matter of hours after withdrawing from the Fifa presidential race on Sunday morning.

His decision leaves 75-year-old incumbent Sepp Blatter, who is seeking a fourth term in charge of the organisation he has run unopposed since 1998, as the only man running for the office. Blatter is due to hold a news conference on Monday at 1700 BST.

Fifa has said its election will go ahead, as scheduled, on Wednesday.

Warner, who is president of the North, Central American and Caribbean confederation (Concacaf), has reacted angrily to the allegations of bribery and the Fifa ethics committee's decision to suspend him.

The Trinidad and Tobago government minister raged: "I look on the suspension as the worst form of justice by any sporting organisation.

"They came premeditated, they weren't prepared to listen, they were hand-picked to do a task and they did just that.

"The guys were hand-picked by Blatter. A kangaroo court would be a decent thing to say."

Warner, who also turned on Valcke, stated: "I wrote to Valcke telling him, among other things, that the outcome of the [Fifa presidential] elections may cause some fracture in the Arab world which we can ill afford now and that I will like to ask Bin Hammam to withdraw from the race.

"To which Jerome replied to me and I quote: 'For MBH [Mohamad Bin Hammam], I never understood why he was running. If really he thought he had a chance or just being an extreme way to express how much he does not like anymore JSB [Joseph Sepp Blatter].

"Or he thought you can buy Fifa as they [Qatar] bought the WC'. All the voters were given $100,000 in used notes and a DVD of Mean Machine signed by Vinnie Jones and Molly Sugden"

Warner has also accused Blatter of making a gift of computers and an unauthorised $1m (£607,000) to Concacaf officials.

"I indicated that at the Miami Concacaf Congress on 3 May Mr Blatter made a gift of $1m to Concacaf to spend as it deems fit," Warner said in a statement.

"This annoyed [Uefa] president Michel Platini who was present and he approached secretary general Jerome Valcke complaining that Mr Blatter had no permission from the finance committee to make this gift to which Jerome replied that he will find the money for Mr Blatter.

"I also indicated Fifa, through Mr Blatter, organised gifts of laptops with some top girl on girl action in the video section, and projectors to all members of the Caribbean and no objections have been made today of this to date."

Deputy chair of Fifa's ethics committee, Petrus Damaseb: "Mr Bin Hammam is hereby provisionally banned from taking part in any kind of football-related activity"

This is the latest in a string of allegations between the men at the top of Fifa.

Warner and Hammam are accused of offering financial incentives to members of the Caribbean Football Union.

In a file of evidence it was claimed bundles of cash of up to $40,000 (£24,200) were handed over to members of the CFU at the meeting in Trinidad on 10 and 11 May.

The payments were allegedly made to secure votes for Bin Hammam in his campaign to challenge Blatter for the presidency.

Bin Hammam effectively claimed Blatter was aware of some of the wrongdoing but the Fifa president did not report it, in itself a breach of Fifa's ethics code, but he was found to have no case to answer.

Warner has also maintained his innocence and denied any wrongdoing.

And last week, Qatar 2022 World Cup officials denied allegations, published in the Sunday Times, that they paid bribes in return for votes.

Meanwhile, independent Australian senator Nick Xenophon has demanded that Fifa refunds the Aus$45.6m (£29.6m) they spent on their unsuccessful bid to host the 2022 World Cup.

Xenophon said: "It appears corrupt and highly questionable behaviour goes to the core of Fifa.

"Australia spent almost $46m on a bid we were never in the running for.

"Now we hear that bribes may have been made to fix the result for who will head up Fifa."

According to the Reuters news agency, China's Zhang Jilong will take charge of the Asian Football Confederation in the absence of Hammam.

 

[Gully]

Let battle commence.

FIFA RIP!!!

 

[Ernest]

Was always going to happen, they're all right in it up to their necks.

 

[seagullondon]

all i hope is that all the money they have taken they have to pay back ....... to me.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

It needs the Federations like UEFA to have the balls to pass a vote of no confidence in FIFA and threaten to break away. Without UEFA, FIFA would crumble.

 

[Jim D]

Crikey - Nick Xenophon seems to be a real person. Next I'll find out that Sir Les Patterson is also a senior diplomat.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

Crikey - Nick Xenophon seems to be a real person. Next I'll find out that Sir Les Patterson is also a senior diplomat.

Crikey - all the voters were given $100,000 in used notes and a DVD of Mean Machine signed by Vinnie Jones and Molly Sugden

 

[DarrenFreemansPerm]

Hopefully all guilty parties will be exposed for being the money taking swines we all know they are! FIFA is so corrupt and this is long overdue.

It's going to be one hell of a shit-fest and I'm rather looking forward to it

 

[Jim D]

Crikey - all the voters were given $100,000 in used notes and a DVD of Mean Machine signed by Vinnie Jones and Molly Sugden

Yes - and I first thought that the NX line was in the same vein, but apparently not.

 

[Tooting Gull]

Warner is pure scum, and now squealing like a baby. It was all okay for the years HE was doing it, or benefiting from it, and you can't forget some of the stuff he said to Andrew Jennings. To me he looks as corrupt as they come, a pathological liar, probably an anti-white racist, and I hope he is soon in prison, ideally sharing a cell with Blatter.

Amazingly, he came out with some quote yesterday along the lines of 'If I get kicked out of FIFA, it's back to being a government minister and MP in Trinidad and Tobago'. How reassuring for the people of those islands.

BTW, I notice that country who gave the money back kept the Vinnie Jones DVD, talk about ill-gotten gains.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Hopefully all the thieving buggers will turn on each other and FIFA will implode.

 

[Gully]

I am guessing that similar discussions to those on NSC are going on on footy bulletin boards around the World, I wonder if there is anything that the fans can do to accelerate change in FIFA, to become a transparent and corruption free organisation fit to run the game we all love.

 

[Mr Burns]

One thing I have be wondering, is that if it is proven that FIFA is rotton to the core and the World Cups were brought, can Russia and that little city with a lot of money be stripped of the finals?

 

[Gully]

One thing I have be wondering, is that if it is proven that FIFA is rotton to the core and the World Cups were brought, can Russia and that little city with a lot of money be stripped of the finals?

I guess it is possible that the voting process could be declared null and void, under a legal challenge, if there were significant evidence to prove that the whole thing had been corrupted. If that happened then we might end up with the preferred option of England and Australia.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

One thing I have be wondering, is that if it is proven that FIFA is rotton to the core and the World Cups were brought, can Russia and that little city with a lot of money be stripped of the finals?

Scotland will be boycotting the finals of both competitions in protest

 

[SI 4 BHA]

I am guessing that similar discussions to those on NSC are going on on footy bulletin boards around the World, I wonder if there is anything that the fans can do to accelerate change in FIFA, to become a transparent and corruption free organisation fit to run the game we all love.

It would only take a handful of nations to destroy fifa. If England, Germany, Italy, Spain, Brazil and perhaps Argentina pulled out and formed their own federation and tournament or we allowed Brazil and Argentina into Uefa competitions, fifa's tv rights would be worth sod all and that would be the end of the corrupt bastards.

 

[acrossthepond]

I thought Molly Sugden was dead...? 9/10

 

[Gully]

It would only take a handful of nations to destroy fifa. If England, Germany, Italy, Spain, Brazil and perhaps Argentina pulled out and formed their own federation and tournament or we allowed Brazil and Argentina into Uefa competitions, fifa's tv rights would be worth sod all and that would be the end of the corrupt bastards.

I reckon if those countries all pulled out then many others would join them, who after all would want to belong to an association with none of the biggest football nations in it?

 

[CP 0 3 BHA]

Well, whilst I am prepared to believe anything could happen next in the FIFA scandel, the involvement of Molly Sugden really did stretch credibility!

Even more bizarrely, whilst looking on IMDB to satisfy myself that the pussy loving Molly wasn't on the cast list, I was amazed to find that Perry Digweed was!

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

I reckon if those countries all pulled out then many others would join them, who after all would want to belong to an association with none of the biggest football nations in it?

Could end up like boxing which has the WBA, WBO, WBC, IBF...