Would-be Fifa chief accused of bribery

Fifa's Presidential election race was plunged into chaos last night as Sepp Blatter’s bitter rival was accused of corruption.

Members of the Caribbean Football Union say they were offered $40,000 at a meeting addressed by Qatar’s Mohamed Bin Hammam.

Just eight days before the vote in Zurich over who will head the global game for the next four years, FIFA announced corruption charges had been brought against Bin Hammam and controversial Trinidadian power-broker Jack Warner.

Both men and two other members of Warner’s Caribbean Football Union, Debbie Minguell and Jason Sylvester, were summoned to Zurich for a hearing of FIFA’s ethics committee on Sunday after America’s long-time Warner cohort Chuck Blazer laid the complaint.

It is suggested that Warner and his colleagues have been accused of accepting an inducement from Bin Hammam to throw the weight of their 30 members behind the Qatari during a meeting in the Bahamas earlier this month.

The file includes sworn affidavits by several members of the Caribbean Football Union who claim they were offered thousands of dollars in cash for “development projects” at the meeting, which Bin Hammam had been invited to in order to speak about his campaign for FIFA president.

Some of the bundles of cash were accepted, the file says, but some of those who refused to take any money approached Blazer. Some of the evidence in the file includes photographs.

At this stage there is no suggestion the Presidential vote will be cancelled and Bin Hammam and Warner both implicitly accused Blatter of a stitch-up as they each protested their innocence.

Warner, named by former FA chairman Lord Triesman as demanding £2.5million to support England’s failed 2018 World Cup bid said: “It is interesting to note the timing of these allegations and the hearing scheduled days before the Fifa Presidential elections.

“I am not aware of any wrongdoing on my part and I shall listen to allegations made and respond accordingly.”

Bin Hammam, whose country was also accused of bribing executive committee members ahead of the victory in the 2022 vote last December, added: “If there is even the slightest justice in the world, these allegations will vanish in the wind.

“This move is little more than a tactic being used by those who have no confidence in their own ability to emerge successfully from the FIFA Presidential election.”