On page283 of Foul, the defining book on “secret world of Fifa”, author Andrew Jennings recounts the time when the issue of bribes were brought up as South Africa bid for the 2010 World Cup.
“Bribes to Fifa officials were usually a taboo subject but in the week before the vote, the South Africans, probably acting on their own secret intelligence, spoke out. “If we have to choose between corrupting people and losing, let’s just lose,” said Essop Pahad, one of Mbeki’s ministers. “We’re not going to give any money to anyone under the table.”
Dead right. Why bother paying anyone under the table when you could just ask your good friends at Fifa to pay them $10-million out in the open. Well, in as open a manner as it is possible to do without making too much fuss about it. Just make the payment, as quick as you can. It’s for the Africa Diaspora legacy. Here’s the thing. Thabo Mbeki did not surround himself with stupid men.
Essop Pahad was not a stupid man. He was a clever politician, a man strong in the struggle. Did none of them stop to ask, just once, where the $10-million was going? How was it to be spent? What programmes would benefit from what is a sizable cash payment in anyone’s terms? Did none of them suggest it be put in a trust, overseen by Fifa, Concacaf and Safa? Did none of them think it might not be the best idea to put Jack Warner in charge of it, a man, despite the protestations of the sports minister, who had been surrounded by a cloud of suspicion for some time?
Jack Warner was dirty long before South Africa began courting him. He was filthy long before England, Australia and all the other bidding nations tried to get him on to their side. South Africa worked the Warner angle hard. They knew what sort of man he was, but they knew they needed him. That much is not up for debate. What is up for debate is how they persuaded him to vote for them. A donation of $10-million is one heck of a lot of persuasion, particularly if the South Africans making the payment are not going to bother asking how their money will be spent. It’s mind-boggling that they would drop $10-million with no notion of where it was going, so mind-boggling that it does not take a huge leap of fact to assume that those intelligent people who have been linked with the signing off of the payment knew exactly what the money was for, but figured themselves to be safe if they didn’t ask too many questions.
Ed Thomas of the BBC asked the questions they did not. “The money, sent on behalf of South Africa, was meant to be used for its Caribbean Diaspora legacy programme,” wrote Thomas. “But documents suggest Mr Warner used the payment for cash withdrawals, personal loans and to launder money. 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 from Fifa accounts were received into Concacaf accounts 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.
“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 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.”
Following in-fighting and finger pointing at Safa and former bid and LOC members, the sports minister has been unleashed as the attack dog to denounce the attack on South Africa’s reputation. “Diaspora” is the defence, which was finally picked up by Safa on Saturday night in a rambling 2770-word statement that echoes the minister’s rant last week. “Safa rejects, with contempt, the attempts to tarnish the image of the country by insinuations that: Support for the African Diaspora programme was wrong; that the African Diaspora programme was not an approved project; that the USD10 million for the African Diaspora was a bribe in exchange for a vote.”
No one has said the African Diaspora programme was wrong. What is wrong and suspicious is that no one bothered to ask how the money was to be spent. By not doing so, dear Safa, you treat South Africans and all other Africans with contempt.