Havelange Resigns Following Guilty Verdict
Joao Havelange has resigned as Honorary President of FIFA after he was found guilty of taking bribes, while his successor as head of football’s governing body, Sepp Blatter, was cleared of breaking any ethics rules – with his handling of the situation described as ‘clumsy’.
Blatter stated afterwards that a repeat of the damage caused by the ISL scandal will not happen again.
The long-awaited report by FIFA’s Ethics Committee into the ISL case was published on Tuesday, with the investigation into the matter now officially closed.
FIFA’s former marketing partner collapsed in 2001, resulting in a criminal investigation which exposed the practice of it buying influence from leading sports officials in return for handing the company lucrative World Cup broadcast and sponsorship rights during the 1990s.
As well as Havelange, the report also named two former Executive Committee members – Ricardo Teixeira and Nicolas Leoz – as receiving bribes, with all three now resigned from FIFA.
Former FIFA president Havelange and Ricardo Teixeira, the former Brazilian Football Confederation president, were named as central figures in the scandal in July 2012. Leoz also resigned from his roles last week, citing health reasons.
FIFA published a Swiss court dossier detailing that Teixeira received at least 12.74 million Swiss francs in payments from ISL in the period spanning 1992-97, while Havelange reportedly received a payment of 1.5 million Swiss francs in 1997. Blatter succeeded him in the FIFA presidency one year later.
Eckert’s report said: ‘It is clear that Havelange and Teixeira, as football officials, should not have accepted any bribe money, and should have had to pay it back since the money was in connection with the exploitation of media rights.’
‘From money that passed through the ISMM/ISL Group, it is certain that not inconsiderable amounts were channelled to Havelange and to his son-in-law Ricardo Teixeira as well as to Nicolas Leoz, whereby there is no indication that any form of service was given in return by them. These payments were apparently made via front companies in order to cover up the true recipient and are to be qualified as ‘commissions’, known today as ‘bribes’.’
Blatter had served as secretary general of FIFA at the time of the ISL and while Eckert’s report cleared him of any wrongdoing it noted that his conduct could be classed as ‘clumsy’.
Blatter added in a statement: ‘I note with satisfaction that this report confirms that ‘President Blatter’s conduct could not be classified in any way as misconduct with regard to any ethics rules’. I have no doubt that FIFA, thanks to the governance reform process that I proposed, now have the mechanisms and means to ensure that such an issue – which has caused untold damage to the reputation of our institution – does not happen again.’
The report stated that with no formal ethics rules in place before 2004, there are no offences that needed to be pursued any further, and with Havelange submitting his resignation effective from 18th April, as well as Leoz’s subsequent exit, any further measures would be redundant.
