Public Service Announcement (5)
1 hour ago
Saturday 3 July 2010
Friday 2 July 2010
Secret millions grease World Cup bid
Two controversial European lobbyists hired to help bring the football World Cup to Australia stand to receive up to $11.37 million in fees and bonuses - one-quarter of the taxpayer-funded bid - according to secret Football Federation Australia files.
The files include a spreadsheet that suggests the federal government was not told specific details about how taxpayers' money was to be spent on the lobbyists and grants to overseas football bodies headed by powerful FIFA officials.
An investigation into Australia's World Cup bid can also reveal how the FFA:
Bought Paspaley pearl necklaces for the wives of many of the 24 FIFA executive committee members who in December will decide which countries will host the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. Pearl cufflinks were also handed out, taking the total value of the gifts to an estimated $50,000.
Offered an all-expenses paid trip to the South American FIFA executive committee member Rafael Salguero and his wife to Australia this year to mark his birthday.
Paid for a Caribbean football team linked to the FIFA vice-president Jack Warner to travel to Cyprus last year.
An FFA document contains two budget balance sheets outlining how the $45.6 million World Cup bid government grant is to be spent.
One balance sheet is for the FFA only and is headed ''bid budget management reporting''. The other is for the government and is less detailed and titled ''bid budget government reporting''.
The spreadsheets from mid-2009 suggest the FFA chose not to disclose to the government specific details of the payment structure for its two consultants, Peter Hargitay and Fedor Radmann.
The FFA said its accounting practices were exemplary and independently audited.
''The FFA is completely transparent in its dealings with government and has provided all information regarding the bidding process requested by government,'' said the FFA chief executive, Ben Buckley, who also declined to reveal publicly what Mr Hargitay and Mr Radmann were being paid.
However, confidential documents show the pair - who have been hired to direct Australia's lobbying of FIFA officials - stand to make $11.37 million if Australia wins the right to host the 2022 World Cup. Australia this month withdrew its bid for the 2018 cup.
Mr Hargitay is being paid $1.35 million by the FFA and has a success fee of $2.54 million. Mr Radmann's work for the Australian bid, which the FFA has tried to keep confidential, will earn him up to $3.49 million through a German consulting firm. He is also entitled to a success fee of $3.99 million.
As part of a separate contract, the FFA is paying Mr Radmann's business partner Andreas Abold an additional $3 million for World Cup "bid book production and bid advice''. It is unclear if Mr Abold will also receive some of Mr Radmann's fees.
The mid-2009 spreadsheet also suggests the government was not told details about plans to give $6.5 million in taxpayer funds to football bodies in Africa, Asia and Oceania. The document says the FFA's bid strategy will give large grants to "international football development''.
The government was told by the FFA that $11.37 million was going to ''consultants/agencies''. But the FFA prepared a more detailed spreadsheet for its own executives, specifically outlining how this figure would be divided into fees and bonuses for Mr Hargitay and Mr Radmann's international ''advocacy'' campaign.
Mr Buckley said: ''Consistent with standard management practice, FFA maintains a more comprehensive breakdown of expenditure and forecasts for day-to-day internal management purposes and accountability.''
The necklaces and cufflinks were given at a dinner in 2008 for FIFA officials at the home of the FFA chairman, Frank Lowy, after Australia had announced its World Cup intentions but before formal bidding had begun.
Mr Buckley said: ''It is a widely accepted, common practice, among governments, many business and sporting organisations to provide symbolic gifts, to visiting international delegations.''
FIFA allows "occasional gifts'' of ''symbolic or incidental value''.
It is believed the FFA funded the Trinidad and Tobago under-20 team's travel to Cyprus at the request of Mr Hargitay, who is close to the Caribbean football chief and FIFA vice-president Jack Warner.
In several FFA documents Mr Hargitay refers to his strong ties to "Jack''. Mr Warner has been repeatedly accused of using FIFA status to enrich himself and his family. After an investigation in 2006 FIFA ordered him to repay $US1 million his family earned through the improper sale of World Cup tickets.
Last October Mr Warner returned a $435 luxury handbag - one of 24 given to the wives of FIFA executive committee members - from the English bid team, after media reports in Britain.
FFA documents make it clear that Mr Radmann and Mr Hargitay are managing the international "strategy" on behalf of the Australian bid team. They boast ties to some of football's most powerful men, including Mr Warner, the former German player Franz Beckenbauer and the FIFA president, Sepp Blatter.
Mr Radmann and Mr Hargitay have colourful histories. Mr Radmann, who has worked as an aide to Beckenbauer, has been implicated in:
A scheme in 2000 to allegedly offer financial inducements to key FIFA executive committee officials to get them to back Germany's bid to host the 2006 World Cup.
Conflict of interest scandals in 2003 that forced him to stand down from Germany's cup organising committee.
It is understood Australian bid officials sought to minimise any publicity about Mr Radmann's involvement in the bid.
Mr Hargitay's past includes being acquitted twice for cocaine trafficking in the 1990s and his alleged link to a securities fraud in Hungary, according to US court documents from 1997.
Mr Hargitay also boasts about daily meetings in South Africa with the Asian Football Confederation boss, Mohammad bin Hamman.
Documents detail Mr Hargitay's role arranging meetings between overseas football officials and Mr Lowy and Australian politicians. The former prime minister Kevin Rudd met Mr Warner in his Trinidad and Tobago home in November.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Health and Ageing, the agency that provided the World Cup grant, said yesterday that the FFA briefed it regularly on its spending.
Asked about differing bid balance sheets, the spokeswoman said: ''The detailed internal accounting systems of the FFA are a matter for them.''
She said the department was aware of the backgrounds of Mr Hargitay and Mr Radmann. It also had no evidence of any breaches of the public service guidelines that cover the FFA's consultants.
All FFA bid team employees and lobbyists must comply with Australia's Public Service code of conduct and act in an honest and ethical manner. The spokeswoman said: ''The FFA has assured the[ department] taskforce that this provision is being adhered to. If evidence contrary to this was provided it would be thoroughly investigated as would any alleged breach of the funding agreement.''
Nick McKenzie & Richard Baker @'SMH'
♪♫ Plan B - Prayin'
Extended version
'Stay Too Long'
The album 'The Defamation of Strickland Banks' that this is from is truly one of the most amazing English soul albums that I have ever heard...No kidding, highly recommended!
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