For many years now, FIFA has been making news headlines and not necessarily good news. The body that is charged with governing the most famous sporting event in the world has come out recently as a body run by corrupt leaders.
The individuals holding the seats in this body have high power, greater responsibility, but it seems there are also perks in the works too!
Invariably, FIFA has been accused of kickbacks, bribery claims, allegations that hit the roof after awarding The Kremlin “Russia” the right to host the World Cup 2018. Qatar was also given the go-ahead to host the World Cup in 2022.
After serious allegations had been levied against the governing body, FIFA took it in its mandate to conduct internal investigations and ended up clearing itself. Currently there are no free bets as to if the people doing the investigations were investigated themselves. The question that lingers in our minds is, why is the United States of all countries interested in investigating and prosecuting FIFA officials?
World Cup News have let the world know that a majority of the people being investigated and may face possible indictment are not even Americans. The thing is; investigations carried out reveal that the suspected individuals planned the crimes they committed on US soil.
Moreover, they utilised the U.S. Banking System and evidence suggest that they had an initial plan after all of turning a handsome profit. The monies would be gained via a scheme that was directed at the now growing United States Soccer Market.
The American Involvement
To get the concept of how the FIFA scandal affect the US, below we highlight a path that touches on Americans at all stages. The FIFA body hired Michael Garcia, who was once the U.S. Attorney for New York’s Southern District.
He was tasked with observing how the Russian and Qatar nations who won the 2018 and 2022 bids to host the World Cup were behaving. The nineteen months that he took to go through the bids the two nations had fronted saw him come up with a 350-page document.
Unfortunately, when he presented his findings to the body governing soccer, it was suppressed and released as a 42-page summary that cleared the body from any wrong doing.
Feeling infuriated by the punitive report, Michael Garcia struck back letting the world know that the findings in his report were both incomplete and erroneous.
The American authority was not pleased with the way FIFA handled the report clearing itself of any blame. The FBI started investigating and keeping tabs on FIFA, and the FBI was eager to know whether the kickbacks and give and take of bribes was done on American soil.
The CONCACAF Link
Since the FBI was keen to find whether there was money exchanged, spent on American soil, their investigations led them to Jeffrey Webb, the current FIFA vice president. He heads the CONCACAF that is charged with overseeing soccer events in North and South America.
It later emerged that Webb misused his office and his trust position soliciting bribes from sports marketing executives. The latter benefitted by winning contracts to provide, and marketing, media and soccer match sponsorships all across the two American continents. Will he remain free? betting on the experience of his lawyers he just might.
Since the scandal stems way back from the last decade of the 20th century, it is estimated that the individuals governing the body has accepted both bribes and kickbacks that are more than $100 million.
Since the bribing and kickbacks were all arranged and went down in the United States, the law gives police to deal with the matter. Free bets that further investigations into the World Cup host nations will turn out ugly for them are rampant and they could end up losing their bids!
