CFU NEWS - Warners response to McBeths latest allegation

Warner’s response to McBeth’s latest allegation

 

Issued on October 22, 2007

 

FIFA Vice President Jack Warner today issued a brief response to allegations made against him in the latest BBC One Panorama programme.

 

In the latest episode, which was scheduled to be aired on Monday, BBC Panorama’s Andrew Jennings looks into several issues including one in which former Chairman of the Scottish FA John McBeth  told BBC Panorama that Warner asked him to make the match fee cheque payable to him personally, following an international match in Edinburgh; And why a FIFA Executive Committee member was allowed to pay his national team players only £500 each for their participation in the World Cup, despite securing lucrative sponsorship deals... and then blacklisted them from the national team when they complained.

 

The BBC Release further added: “Speaking for the first time on the subject, McBeth revealed how Mr Warner, who represents FIFA in North and Central America and the Caribbean, had asked him to pay a match fee directly into his personal account.

 

He said: "Trinidad and Tobago came to play Scotland at Hibernian's ground in Easter Road in Edinburgh. And after the game he asked me to make a cheque out to his personal account for the game. And I said 'We don't do that, it should go to the association'.

"I then found out later that he'd approached several other staff in my organisation... to do exactly the same thing."

 

Panorama also asks why FIFA's ethics committee - run by Sebastian Coe - is not taking action. Panorama asked Lord Coe why the ethics committee was not looking into these issues he declined to answer or give any details of his job, referring all queries to FIFA itself.

 

Warner, President of CONCACAF and the Caribbean Football Union, has since Sunday been asked by several international media companies for a response.

 

He added only : “I have nothing much to say except to say that the statement is a patent lie issued by someone whom I got removed from the FIFA Ex Co and whose memory has suddenly come to life. Let the public judge for itself both the person who is making that statement and the journalist who is writing it and join the dots.”

 

McBeth, in May this year, claimed "poor nations" in Africa have different ethics from the British "fair play" attitude.

 

McBeth said: "As soon as you hit Africa it's a slightly different kettle of fish. They're poor nations and want to grab what they can. I know two or three whom I'd want to count my fingers after shaking hands with them.

 

"I presume the Caribbean is much the same - they just come at it in a different way."

 

Meantime, last  week CONCACAF also issued a release stating :“Panorama's letters to Jack Warner and Chuck Blazer asking whether England can expect Fair Play in a potential bid to host World Cup 2018 are truly curious given that Warner and Blazer are the only two remaining members of the FIFA Executive Committee of the original five that voted for England's previous World Cup bid (for 2006).

 

“The other three, Charlie Dempsey (New Zealand with Scottish birth), David Will (FIFA Vice President from the British Associations) and Isaac Sasso Sasso (Costa Rica, also from CONCACAF) no longer sit on the decision making body. Dempsey left shortly after his refusal to vote in the round following England's elimination for 2006, while Will and Sasso retired from the FIFA body this year. Certainly, if anyone personifies fair play towards England, Warner and Blazer, who supported England's 2006 bid and in doing so stood against the 19 other members opposed, are the ones. Panorama might have asked instead, will it be Fair Play if CONCACAF, the Confederation next in sequence for rotation of World Cup hosts, is denied the right for one of its members to host 2018 in favor of another system instigated by the desire of others to overturn a policy intended to establish fairness?” the release added.