Suspicion Was Always There

The South African in me would like to believe that our country won the right to host the 2010 World Cup fair and square. After all, we had a good bid. Confirming us as the front runner in early May 2004, the Fifa inspection group concluded that South Africa had the potential to organise an "excellent" World Cup compared to Egypt and Morocco's potential to organise "very good" World Cups and Tunisia's potential to organise a "good" World Cup. Libya, the inspection group had found, would face great difficulties in organising a World Cup to the required standards. There had already been a commitment by Fifa to bring soccer's showpices event to Africa. Given our infrastructure position, it was almost certain that hosting the tournament would come our way. If our plans as stated in the bid document were not enough and our excellent notice by the inspection group, we had the towering stature of world icon Nelson Mandela behind our bid.

On the face of it, we did not need to pay a bribe to anyone to secure the right to host the World Cup. But if recent revelations are anything to go by, mine might be a naive view. Money and whose palms are greased apparently play a big role in determining who hosts the world's biggest sporting event. The suspicion had always been there but has now been confirmed by Charles Gordon Blazer. But for his position as a former Fifa executive committee member, Blazer could have been easily dismissed as another whacko that is probably being used by his country in its supposed ambition to be the world's policeman. Russia's Vladimir Putin has already fired a salvo in this regard arguing that the probe into Fifa is "another clear attempt by the US to spread its jurisdiction to other states."

Also, there is the view that Blazer is being used by America in an ultimate plan to undermine Russia's right to host the next World Cup in 2018. This theory is fuelled by the fact that the Swiss federal prosecutors are investigating the bidding process for the 2018 World Cup alongside the awarding of the 2022 World Cup to Qatar. Put aside any political motives that may or may not exist, Blazer is a former insider and knows where the bodies are buried. He has entered into a plea bargain with US authorities after realising he can't solely carry what appears to be Fifa's institutional sins. And what about our own? Did we commit any? The official positiion is that we didn't. We simply asked Fifa to deduct from what was due to us and pay part of it to the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (Concacaf) for a legacy programme for the diaspora and specifically the Caribbean countries.

So far, the storyline sounds convincing. But it starts to unravel when a letter signed by then-South African Football Association (Safa) boss Molefi Oliphant, reportedly drafted by former local organising committee chief executive Danny Jordaan, surfaces. Donating money for soccer development for Africans in the diaspora is noble - though the confederation of African Football must be amused - but directing that such "shall be administered and implemented directly" by Concacaf President Jack Warner isn't. It is a basic control and governance issue that no individual should be given the kind of power Warner was given. The Concacaf was not his personal fiefdom and South African soccer officials should not have written lettes to Fifa that sought to elevate Warner above his federation and give him control over a donation, which rightfullly belonged to his federation.

It is rich of our authorities to argue that the fact that the money was misused is not our problem. I beg to differ. To the extent that it is our citizens and football administrators who directed that a particular individual must administer the money, it is our problem. It makes us complicit. We should have simply donated the money to Concacaf and left it at that. But is gets more intriguing. Who took the decision to donate the money? Was it the government or Safa? If it was the latter, where are the minutes or the record of such a decision? Isn't that supposed to be a resolution of the Safa membership? If it was the government, where is the record of such a cabinet decision?

Digging our hole even deeper is the clear lack of a co-ordinated response when the story first broke. This has been woresened by the differences reported in the media between Jordaan and Oliphant, with the latter reported as saying he feels betrayed over a letter Jordaan did not disclose.