Ricardo Teixeira - Corruption Allegations

Corruption Allegations

In 1994, after winning the World Cup in the USA, the Brazilian Team returned home in a private flight. On arrival in Brazil, Teixeira refused to abide by the rules of Brazilian Customs, on the grounds that "a title of the Brazilian Team is worthy much more than the custom taxes"; later on, it was discovered that many players had brought boxes of undeclared stuff (particularly computers and electronic appliances, which were expensive in Brazil at the time), and that Mr. Teixeira himself had packed a full beer making machine, that he used in a bar he opened a few months later - after a long dispute with Brazilian IRS, Teixeira paid the due taxes and fines.

In 2000, Teixeira faced a Probing Commission in Brazilian Congress. He was charged of taking illegal advantage of contracts with Nike: the Brazil Team would satisfy Nike's interests, and Teixeira would rake the financial gains. Again, Teixeira had to pay taxes on the basis of non declared revenues.

In November 2010 Andrew Jennings, the presenter of "FIFA's Dirty Secrets", an edition of BBC's flagship current affairs programme Panorama alleged that Teixeira had taken bribes in the 1990s regarding the awarding of contracts for the sale of television rights to the football World Cup., Teixeira waited until 25 July 2011 to respond to the allegations, at which point he attacked The Football Association, saying he would "make their lives hell" as long as he remained a member of FIFA's ruling Executive Committee.

The Brazilian authorities started in October 2011 an investigation to evaluate the possibility of money laundering by Ricardo Teixeira through the Brazilian Football Confederation. The authorities will have 90 days to complete the investigation which also alleges the involvement of João Havelange as part of the scheme. Andrew Jennings told the Senate committee that Ricardo Teixeira may have amassed $9.5m in bribes from now-defunct FIFA marketing firm ISL.

In July 2012 after protracted court proceedings, Havelange and Teixeira were named as beneficiaries of bribes from ISL. A document released by a prosecutor in the canton of Zug revealed that from 1992 to 2000 Havelange and Teixeira were paid 41m CHF by ISL.

At the time of the payment of the bribes, commercial bribery was not a crime in Switzerland. In 1997 as President of FIFA Havelange had granted ISL FIFA's exclusive marketing rights, and exclusive TV and radio rights to the 2002 and 2006 World Cups in 1998. ISL paid FIFA 200m CHF for the marketing rights and $1.4bn for the TV rights. After ISL's bankruptcy its liquidators examined all payments made by the company.

FIFA, under the presidency of Sepp Blatter, was found to have known about the bribes, yet argued it did not need to have the money repaid. Prosecutions were mounted for alleged embezzlement against Havelange and Teixeira, but were stopped in May 2010, after Havelange and Texeira repaid 500,000 and 2.5m CHF respectively. The repayments were considered reasonable due to the fact that bribes paid before 1995 were outside the statute of limitations, and Havelange's advanced age. The prosecutor also believed that Havelange and Teixeira were guilty of criminal breaches of their duties to serve FIFA as senior executives.