It's the latest in the Fifa he-said-she-said saga. And unsurprisingly the most recent accusation of corruption comes from suspended vice-president Jack Warner, who claims Sepp Blatter attempted to buy votes off his Caribbean Federation members – and the 2022 World Cup was 'bought'.That's right, Warner has reacted to his suspension on Sunday by claiming FIFA president Blatter is just as bad as he is – adding that secretary general Jerome Valke had also told him that Qatar had bought the 2022 World Cup.
Warner and Asia federation president Mohamed Bin Hammam were suspended from their posts after an ethical hearing ruled they both had a case to answer against allegations of corruption.
This left Blatter to run unopposed in the presidential elections which are due to to be held on Wednesday, as Bin Hammam was his only opponent.
Keeping up? Good. Now Warner – who denies all charges of corruption – has claimed that Blatter "made a gift of US$1 million to CONCACAF to spend as it deems fit".
Warner went on to say he told Valcke that "at the CFU meeting held in Trinidad on May 10 which was requested by Mr Bin Hammam, FIFA through Mr Blatter organised gifts of laptops and projectors to all members of the Caribbean and no objections have been made today of this to date".
His accusations make Fifa look even more like a bickering family at a reading of a will, but they are not as explosive as his claims that Valcke had expressed his misgivings in an email about Bin Hammam running for president against Blatter.
Warner said: "I wrote to Valcke telling him, among other things, that the outcome of the elections may cause some fracture in the Arab world which we can ill-afford now and that I will like to ask Bin Hammam to withdraw from the race.
"To which Jerome replied to me and I quote: 'For Bin Hammam, I never understood why he was running. If really he thought he had a chance or just being an extreme way to express how much he does not like Blatter any more.
Or he thought you can buy FIFA as they bought the World Cup'."
FIFA are duty-bound to investigate Warner's claims about Bin Hammam, although the fact he chose the day of his suspension to make them public makes them less believable.
Blatter – for many the ugly face of FIFA – is the only man to have remained silent in this entire debacle, apart from his insistence ahead of his own ethical hearing that he had done nothing wrong. At this juncture it seems the wisest solution.
