CBN BRASIL

Friday, May 29, 2015

Brazil launches congressional inquiry into corruption after Fifa arrests

 Romário announces that support has been secured for inquiry 
 Ex-CBF president José Maria Marin was among those arrested in Zurich 
 Fifa corruption crisis: the key figures
CBF headquarters

The fallout from the police swoop on Fifa executives continues to grow in Brazil, where the police and congress have launched inquiries into alleged money laundering and tax evasion.
The focus of the investigation is the former president of the Brazilian Football Confederation (CBF) José Maria Marin, who was arrested in Zurich on Wednesday, but is likely to widen to include his predecessor and other senior football officials.
The federal lawmaker and former national team striker Romário announced on Twitter that he secured enough support to launch a congressional inquiry into the corruption allegations.
He also expressed satisfaction at the detentions on Wednesday. “Many of the corrupt officials and thieves who have harmed football were arrested,” he said. “Even one of the largest in the country who is called José Maria Marin.” A long-term critic of the CBF, Romário said his only regret was that Brazilian police failed to make the arrests at last year’s World Cup and instead left the job up to the Swiss and US justice authorities.
The justice minister, José Eduardo Cardozo, also announced a criminal investigation into allegations of financial wrongdoing. President Dilma Rousseff – who has a well-known antipathy towards Marin, dating back to the dictatorship era – has expressed support for the anti-corruption drive.
The CBF president, Marco del Nero, flew back early from Zurich to deal with the crisis, which he has acknowledged as “very bad” for the reputation of his organisation. In a sign of the rapidly changing winds, he ordered the removal of the lettering outside the CBF headquarters in Rio de Janeiro bearing the building’s now-embarrassing name: “José Maria Marin”.
Police and congressional inquiries into football have been launched on more than a dozen occasions in Brazil to zero effect because of close ties between the politicians and the CBF, which also sponsors police football events.
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This time, however, it may prove harder to sweep allegations under the carpet because the primary investigation is being carried out in the United States.
The main source of FBI information about wrongdoing in Brazil is José Hawilla, the president of the sports marketing group Traffic, who has admitted to US authorities that he paid bribes to football bosses across the continent. The former hot-dog hawker, ad salesman and radio reporter spent 30 years building up Latin America’s most powerful sports marketing company with the help of his friend and former head of the CBF Ricardo Teixeira (who has also come under fire for corruption).
It was Hawilla who brokered the 1996 deal between Nike and the CBF to sponsor the national team, which is mentioned in the US indictment.
Traffic’s tentacles stretch across the region. It controlled TV marketing rights for last year’s World Cup in Brazil, as well as the Copa Libertadores, the Copa América and the Copa do Brasil. Among his partners is the former national team striker Ronaldo.
It also owns stakes in several players including Argentina’s Darío Conca and Brazil’s Hernanes, sells executive boxes in the Palmeiras stadium in São Paulo and runs the Estoril Praia club in Portugal.
Among his partners in Traffic is Ronaldo, who has taken a very different path from Romário since the two were team-mates. The company is said to generate an annual turnover in the region of $500m.
Hawilla’s lawyer José de Oliveira Lima says his client confessed to fraud, money laundering and obstruction of justice in a plea bargain in December last year. At that time he paid $25m towards the $151m he has agreed to return.
In Argentina, a judge issued arrest warrants for the three businessman named in the US indictment – Alejandro Burzaco, and the father and son Hugo and Mariano Jinkis. They are likely to be extradited to the US. The government spokesman Aníbal Fernández vowed that allegations of bribery and tax avoidance would be investigated “no matter the cost”.
In Paraguay, the foreign ministry confirmed that it had received a request from the US embassy for the extradition of former president of the South American Football confederation Nicolás Leoz, but this could take several weeks to process. Leoz hospitalised himself on Wednesday for “flu treatment” after hearing the news of the arrests. His lawyer said he will plead innocent to all charges.
In Costa Rica, local prosecutors launched a probe into the president of the football association, Eduardo Li, who was among those detained in Zurich on Wednesday.

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