Overseas aid fund tapped for World Cup bid
RICHARD BAKER AND NICK MCKENZIE
July 2, 2010

Geoff Thompson: Attempt to make him an honorary consul.

Geoff Thompson.

AUSTRALIA'S World Cup bid team has used the nation's foreign aid budget, and proposed appointing key FIFA officials as honorary consuls, as part of its strategy to win backing for its campaign.

The revelations come as FIFA, soccer's world governing body, announced in Johannesburg it would investigate reports in The Age that Australian bid officials handed out jewellery and paid travel costs for a Trinidad team.

''FIFA can confirm that it is looking into this matter,'' it said in a statement. ''For the time being, FIFA cannot disclose any other details or make any further comment.''

The Age can reveal that federal government aid agency AusAID has agreed to help Football Federation Australia's World Cup bid and has boosted funding for aid programs in Africa and Oceania.

The FFA is trying to win support from the African and Oceania representatives on FIFA's executive committee - a group of 24 men who decide the location of the World Cup.

Government sources said the FFA last year took the extraordinary step of raising with the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade the possibility of appointing FIFA executive committee members to Australian government representative positions, known as ''honorary consuls''.

The Age understands the FFA last year discussed appointing Ivory Coast FIFA executive committee member Jacques Adamou and then-UK FIFA executive committee member Geoff Thompson to the quasi-diplomatic roles.

Mr Thompson, who recently replaced Lord David Triesman as the head of England's 2018 World Cup bid team, is reportedly close to the FFA's highly paid lobbyist, European consultant Peter Hargitay.

Under federal government rules, honorary consuls are appointed only ''where there is a demonstrated need for an Australian presence to provide consular services to Australians overseas''.

A DFAT spokesman said the government has had a range of talks with the FFA on how best to support its World Cup bid, but had ''not appointed honorary consuls in relation to the FFA bid''. DFAT sources said it was unlikely the agency would ever support the FFA request.

Documents seen by The Age reveal AusAID director-general Bruce Davis was told by senior FFA figures in March last year they were ''looking for the capacity to provide Australian aid assistance that is identifiably 'football delivered' and football relevant, though not necessarily football exclusive''.

It is understood that last year, then-prime minister Kevin Rudd, senior ministers and top public servants supported FFA's overseas strategy to help win either the 2018 or 2022 World Cups. Australia has since withdrawn its 2018 bid.

Former DFAT deputy secretary Paul Barrett said any proposal to appoint FIFA officials as honorary consuls was ''extremely improper'' and that Australia's relatively ''scarce'' aid budget should be distributed with the primary aims of reducing poverty and promoting development.

''If aid is motivated by a desire to host the World Cup, then it would fail to meet these primary aims,'' Mr Barrett said.

Australia's aid to Africa was increased at about the same time the FFA was lobbying the government behind the scenes to support its strategy of winning favour from African nations that have sway on FIFA's executive committee. In 2009-10, the government increased its aid spending in Africa by 40 per cent to $163 million, although there is no suggestion this was due to lobbying by the FFA.

It is understood the government viewed the boost in Africa aid spending as helpful for its bid to win a seat on the United Nation's Security Council.

Australia has also committed to a tenfold increase in tertiary scholarships for African students by 2012-13.

Departmental sources familiar with Mr Rudd's involvement in the bid confirmed he was told by the FFA that it was putting ''a lot of effort into Africa and the four voting members from the African continent''. They are Egypt, Ivory Coast, Cameroon and Nigeria.

In one briefing to Mr Rudd, the FFA advised: ''We have had a preliminary discussion with AusAID about a similar program in some of these [African] countries as the one we recently signed with Oceania.''

Australian embassies and high commissions in Africa have hosted cocktail parties for members of FIFA's executive committee over the past 12 months using bid funds.

AusAID has also been approached to support FFA recommended projects in Asia and the Caribbean.

In August last year the federal government announced $4 million over four years to provide ''football delivered'' aid to nations in the Pacific in partnership with the Oceania Football Confederation, which has one vote on FIFA's executive committee. The Oceania region has one FIFA executive committee member, Reynald Temarii from Tahiti.

Working with A-League sponsor Hyundai, the FFA has delivered cars to each football association in the Oceania region, except New Zealand.

The FFA's controversial multimillion-dollar European consultants, Mr Hargitay, Fedor Radmann and Andreas Abold have been strongly involved in the Africa strategy. At their suggestion, Foreign Affairs Minister Stephen Smith and Sports Minister Kate Ellis have attended FIFA junior soccer tournaments.

Mr Abold had the task of arranging for Archbishop Desmond Tutu to visit a South African hospital with FFA chairman Frank Lowy and FFA chief executive Ben Buckley late last year.

At the event, where the FFA donated $150,000 to a hospital, Archbishop Tutu declared his support for Australia. Last month in South Africa, FFA spent $160,000 providing lapdesks to township children outside Johannesburg, adding to a government program.

This week The Age revealed the FFA planned to pay up to $11.37 million in taxpayer-funded fees and bonuses to Mr Radmann and Mr Hargitay.

FIFA's executive committee will announce the successful World Cup bidders in December. The FFA has insisted its bid is above board, but declined to comment last night.

Exclusive: Australian World Cup Bid Hit Back at "Unsubstantiated and Damaging" Stories
http://www.worldfootballinsider.com/Story.aspx?id=33495

Australia’s World Cup bid team have written to FIFA to warn them of what they term “unsubstantiated and damaging” stories about the conduct of their bid.

The letter came before FIFA yesterday launched an investigation into a series of exposes by newspapers in the country’s Fairfax media group, which include The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.

In a series of articles this week it has alleged that the bid team offered inappropriate gifts to FIFA ex-co members, including pearl jewellery and holidays to Australia.

The 24 FIFA Executive members decide where the 2018 and 2022 finals are heading on December 2.

The newspapers also allege that nearly one quarter of Australia’s $45.6million ($38.92million) taxpayer-funded bid is payable in fees and bonuses to two of its international bid consultants. They have suggested that the bid has misled the Australian government in its internal accounting processes.

“The FFA is very confident nothing will come of this ‘please explain’ as it has acted completely within FIFA guidelines at every turn,” a bid spokesman told INSIDER.

“There is nothing untoward, nothing to hide and nothing to concern FIFA or the Federal Government in any of these allegations.”

He added that the A$2,000 pearl necklace given to Jack Warner's wife Maureen last year was nothing to do with the bid and was only presented to her after she missed out on the gift at the 2008 FIFA Congress. He said that the value of the necklace was A$850.

In a fierce attack on the journalists – Nick McKenzie and Richard Baker – who uncovered the stories, the spokesman dismissed their work as “innuendo” based on “unsourced gossip and insinuations [that] have no substance whatsoever.”

Yet INSIDER understands that the exposes are based on more than 100 leaked documents and that the bid has made no legal challenge to try and suppress them. Such legal moves by an "injured" party usually precede publication of “unsubstantiated and damaging” stories.

The authors are also among Australia’s most highly respected investigative reporters, with McKenzie twice winning the Walkey Prize – the country’s highest journalism award – for his work exposing police corruption and organized crime in the horse-racing industry.

In Friday’s editions they allege that the Australian Federation (FFA) discussed appointing England’s World Cup bid chairman, Geoff Thompson, to the quasi-diplomatic role of Honorary Counsel. INSIDER understands that no formal approach was made to the FIFA vice-president about the role.

Despite the exorbitant fees – which the FFA insist are exaggerated – apparently committed to its bid consultants, the most damaging aspect of the affair is the accusation that the bid has misled the Australian taxpayer.

According to the reports two separate budgets were used to report to FFA managers and the Australian government. These projections suggest that the FFA management were told that A$602,500 would be spent on community initiatives but that the Government was told that these would cost A$3,416,665 - more than six times as much. The implication was that money was diverted for other purposes.

The FFA insist that this is “not an issue” and symptomatic of the fact that its internal budgets are “far more detailed.”

“The sheets look very different but all come to the same conclusion,” said its spokesman.

“The government gets quarterly update reports on every cent spent and on what and they are audited by them, us and a third party,” he added.

How a $2.8 million discrepancy appeared between budgets was not clear, but the FFA suggested that the Australian government will release a statement clearing them of wrongdoing

But one source with knowledge of the bid told INSIDER that the case left the government with a quandry.

“To do anything but support the FFA would kill the bid,” they said.

“If there is substance to these allegations what can they do? Or if they decide that in a time of economic crisis it’s inappropriate to pay a foreign adviser millions of dollars they’re powerless.

"The government have a real problem on their hands.”

Why is everyone so suprised by the hatred of Fairfax press and Murdochs Daily Telegraph for football...hey have been "bashing our beautiful game for the best part of 50 years....they are very abusive and extremely hostile...Football fans across Australia say start the BOYCOTT of both papers

Ron Walker AC CBE
Ron Walker has been a prominent businessman in Australia for more than 30 years and was Lord Mayor of Melbourne from 1974 to 1976.

Ron was founder and Chairman of one of Australia’s largest private chemical companies between 1963 and 1976, was co-founder, director and major shareholder of Hudson Conway Limited and co-founder of Crown Casino Limited. He is Chairman of Fairfax Media Limited and Chairman of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation.

Ron was awarded an Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 1976 for services to local government, and an Oreder of Australia (AC) in 1987 for services to the community.

He also serves as Chairman of St Vincent’s Hospital Microsurgery Foundation and John Fairfax Holdings, a media company which publishes both Melbourne' The Age and Sydney's Sydney Morning Herald newspaper.

A truly amazing beat up.