[FIFA IN CRISIS] Assume for a moment -- let's dream -- FIFA cleans up its act and adopts a new governance structure that rids it of the conflicts that plague it, there is still the matter of cleaning up its six confederations. Three confederation presidents have been suspended in the last six months on corruption charges, two others have been accused of taking bribes going back more than two decades and the sixth, the clean one in the bunch, is believed to have cast his vote for Qatar 2022, on orders from his country's president.
REYNALD TEMARII (Oceania). Banned for one year and fined 5,000 Swiss francs ($5,887) in November 2010 for breaches of the FIFA ethics code. He was caught in a sting by London Sunday Times reporters discussing money needed to build an Oceania "sports academy."
JACK WARNER (Concacaf). Provisionally suspended on Sunday on charges that he conspired with Asian Football Confederation President Mohamed bin Hammam to bribe Caribbean Football Union (CFU) members to vote for bin Hammam's since-aborted FIFA presidential bid. Warner was previously reprimanded by FIFA and fined around $1 million after allegedly selling tickets to 2006 World Cup games on the black market. FIFA dropped an English FA investigation into the Trinidadian's dealings with the FA during its World Cup 2018 bid campaign.
MOHAMED BIN HAMMAM (Asia). Also provisionally suspended on Sunday pending a full investigation into a scheme with Warner to buy the votes of the 25 CFU FIFA members at $40,000 apiece. On Saturday, bin Hammam abandoned his presidential bid. (Many believe it was part of a deal between FIFA and Qatar 2022 to put a damper on the mounting pressure to pull the World Cup from the Gulf state.)
ISSA HAYATOU (Africa). Accused by a whistle-blower in a Sunday Times report submitted to the British Parliament of taking $1.5 million to vote for Qatar 2022. (The whistle-blower has since been unable to reach an agreement to meet with FIFA officials about the charges against Hayatou and Jacques Anouma of Ivory Coast.) The IOC, of which Hayatou is also a member, also asked that evidence of wrong-doing be passed along to its ethics committee. The IOC has been investigating the Cameroonian in relation to a BBC report last November in which he was accused of receiving kickbacks of about $20,000 via secret Liechtenstein bank accounts from FIFA's then-marketing partner ISL.
NICOLAS LEOZ (South America). FIFA also dropped the English FA investigation into Leoz's dealings with the FA during its World Cup 2018 bid campaign. It found no evidence that the 83-year-old Paraguayan sought to be knighted. The report did cite evidence that Leoz advisers asked about -- if you can believe this -- having the FA Cup named after him. Like Hayatou and Brazilian Ricardo Teixeira, he was named in a BBC report last November in which he was accused of receiving secret payments totaling $730,000 from ISL.
MICHEL PLATINI (Europe). The former French superstar is considered the soccer voice of international soccer politics, insisting this week he is "incorruptible." He is believed to have voted for Qatar for 2022 World Cup, though, on orders of the French government because of the deep ties between the Qatari government and French business interests. (French President Nicolas Sarkozy is very close with Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani.) Once Qatar was awarded the World Cup, Platini came out against its plans to host the 2022 tournament in the summer.



Gus Keri


