Soccer:Fifa president Sepp Blatter insists he will "fight" corruption within the organisation if the latest allegations of bribery turn out to be true. Six members of the association's executive committee were this morning implicated in "unethical" behaviour by British MPs at the culture, media and sport committee in the House of Commons.
Two members, Fifa vice-president Issa Hayatou from Cameroon and Jacques Anouma from the Ivory Coast were paid €1.04 million by Qatar, according to claims highlighted in an astonishing morning of whistle-blowing at the inquiry.
Lord Triesman, former FA and England 2018 World Cup bid chairman, also made claims of “improper and unethical” behaviour by four other executive committee (ExCo) members, including Fifa vice-president Jack Warner, who has already strenuously denied the allegations.
Two other Fifa members, Amos Adamu from Nigeria and Reynald Temarii from Tahiti, were banned by the body’s ethics committee last year.
The latest developments means no fewer than eight Fifa ExCo members - one third of the 24 total - have either been alleged to have been or already found guilty of impropriety in relation to the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids.
"I am fighting for Fifa to clean Fifa," Blatter told Sky Sportsthis afternoon. "If this is true I will fight it."
Tory MP Damian Collins this morning said evidence submitted by the Sunday Times, which the committee will publish, claimed that Hayatou and Anouma were paid €1.04 million by Qatar.
Collins said: " The Sunday Times' submission, and this is to be published by us later, claims that $1.5 million (€1.04m) was paid to Fifa executive committee members Issa Hayatou and Jacques Anouma who went on to vote for Qatar."
Collins said the submission claimed Qatar specifically employed a fixer to arrange deals with African members for their votes.
Adamu and Temarii and four other Fifa officials were banned by Fifa's ethics committee last year after a Sunday Timesinvestigation into World Cup bidding.
Triesman later said Warner asked for money - understood to be €2.85 million - to build an education centre in Trinidad with the cash to be channelled through him, and later €570,000 to buy Haiti World Cup TV rights for the earthquake-hit nation, also to go through Warner.
Warner strenuously denied this today, first telling Sky Sportshe had "no intention dignifying" the allegations with a response and accusing Triesman, who was sacked from the England bid after alleging Spain were trying to bribe referees at the 2010 World Cup, of trying to "revive dying political career by piece of foolishness."
He then added: "I have never asked Triesman nor any other person, Englishman or otherwise, for any money for my vote at any time."
According to Triesman, Paraguay’s Fifa member Nicolas Leoz asked for a knighthood, while Brazil’s Fifa member Ricardo Terra Teixeira asked him to “come and tell me what you have got for me”.
Thailand’s Fifa member Worawi Makudi wanted to be given the TV rights to a friendly between England and the Thai national team, said Triesman.
He added: “These were some of the things that were put to me personally, sometimes in the presence of others, which in my view did not represent proper and ethical behaviour on the part of members of the executive committee.”
John Whittingdale, chairman of the committee, said he would now be writing to Blatter to launch an investigation into the evidence “as a matter of urgency”.
Triesman added that he would undertake to provide his evidence to any Fifa inquiry.
In relation to the claims about payments made by Qatar 2022, Mike Lee, the London-based public relations consultant who worked on Qatar’s bid, said he was unaware of any payments being made.
Lee, formerly communications director of the Premier League, Uefa and London’s 2012 Olympic bid, told MPs: “I was working at the highest level of that bid and talking at length with the chairman and CEO and saw no evidence of any of these allegations.
“My experience is I would have had a sense if such things were going on and I had no sense of that.”
