FIFA executives accused of selling votes

Two FIFA Executive Committee members have been caught on video offering to sell their votes in the competition to host the 2018 FIFA World Cup for cash. FIFA has initiated an investigation into the allegations. The video footage was made by undercover reporters from the British newspaper ‘The Sunday Times’, posing as lobbyists for American companies trying to procure votes to bring the 2018 World Cup to the USA. The footage shows Nigerian Amos Adamu, asking for $800,000 for a personal project and Tahiti’s Reynald Temarii, demanding $2.4 million to pay for an academy in exchange for their votes, writes World Football Insider.

Adamu and Temarii are two of the 24 FIFA Executive Committee members that are to vote on the hosts for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups on December 2.

FIFA will investigate the allegations
In the wake of these allegations, FIFA issued a statement saying that “FIFA has already requested to receive all of the information and documents related to this matter, and is awaiting to receive this material”.

“In any case, FIFA will immediately analyse the material available and only once this analysis has concluded will FIFA be able to decide on any potential next steps. In the meantime, FIFA is not in a position to provide any further comments on this matter", Blatter writes on fifa.com.

According to the Voice of Leadership, a source close to the executive said that both Adamu and Temarii could find themselves suspended or off the committee by then if the claims against them were substantiated.

"FIFA will not allow anyone or anything to damage the reputation of the voting procedure and it could be that 22 men might make the decision, not 24," the source said.

FIFA President Sepp Blatter has written an open letter to the Executive Committee, which can be found on fifa.com, stating that the information in the Sunday Times article has created a very negative impact on FIFA and on the bidding process for the 2018 and 2022 FIFA World Cups and asking the members to “refrain from making any public comments on this matter”

Adamu well-known by Play the Game
The current corruption allegations made towards Amos Adamu are just the latest in a long row of claims made against him. Olukayode Thomas, Nigerian investigative journalist, has investigated Adamu for years and has through his research unearthed several acts of corruption, intimidation, bribery and vote-fixing.

On Play the Game’s conference in 2009, Thomas told the story of his investigations into Adamu. Read his presentation here

Other Play the Game articles on Amos Adamu:

• How elections in the Nigerian Football Association were fixed
• Nigeria risks FIFA ban as government haunts soccer president
• African sports: Ready for critical journalists?

In the new report titled “Killing Soccer in Africa”, Thomas has contributed with the article “Players give back, officials eat”, exposing corruption and mismanagement in Nigerian football including Adamu’s role in the matter.

Read the article here

Read more about the report here