Lausanne (AFP)
A former world football figure, Ricardo Teixeira, former president of the Brazilian Football Federation (CBF), was in turn suspended for life for his involvement in Fifagate's vast corruption scandal.
Even if the son-in-law of former FIFA president Joao Havelange, who has died today, has never been sentenced by American justice, unlike his successor, José Maria Marin, he will no longer be able to take up any activity in the country. football, at national and international level, has decided the commission of ethics, internal justice of Fifa which also imposed a fine of 1 million CHF (907.000 EUR).
An all-powerful boss of Brazilian football from 1989 to 2012, the 72-year-old lawyer was suspended for life for bribery in exchange for contracts awarded to companies for media rights and marketing competitions of the CBF , the Confederation of South American Football (Conmebol) and the Confederation of North America, Central America and the Caribbean (Concacaf), between 2006 and 2012, according to the release of Fifa.
As part of this huge scandal dubbed "Fifagate", only two former South American football officials appeared in the United States in 2018 during a lawsuit that exposed the millions of dollars in bribes paid by sports marketing to football officials in Latin America, in exchange for television rights and promotion of continental tournaments, including Copa America and Copa Libertadores.
- Involved in the ISL case -
Juan Angel Napout, former boss of the Paraguayan Federation and former president of the Conmebol, was sentenced to nine years in prison, the heaviest sentence handed down by American justice against a South American football baron in the Fifagate case .
The former president of the Brazilian Confederation, José Maria Marin, was sentenced to four years in prison.
Unlike José Maria Marin, arrested in Zurich in 2015, Mr. Teixeira was not tried in the United States because he was never extradited.
Marco Polo Del Nero, Mr. Marin's successor, has also been suspended for life for his involvement in this vast scandal.
Long before the Fifagate, Ricardo Teixeira, an ally of former FIFA President Sepp Blatter, still suspended, who had won the organization of the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, was also one of the main beneficiaries of the ISL business.
Holding exclusive rights to the World Cup, ISL went bankrupt in 2001. According to court documents published in 2012, it appears that this company had paid bribes to Mr Blatter's predecessor, Joao Havelange.
In total, according to the same documents, Havelange and her son-in-law Teixeira received more than 40 million Swiss francs (EUR 37 million) in bribes from ISL between 1992 and 2000.
These sums were presented as commissions, but at the time the private commissions were not considered as corruption in Switzerland.
© 2019 AFP