By Samindra Kunti
January 3 – The Brazilian Football Confederation, the CBF, wants to rekindle their relationship with FIFA, because the governing body still owe the confederation $100 million from the 2014 World Cup legacy fund, but the presence of CBF president Marco Polo Del Nero is proving to be an obstacle.
The CBF is entitled to $100 million (R$ 326 million) from the World Cup’s legacy fund, but FIFA has repeatedly refused to free the money, maintaining that it won’t do so as long as Del Nero is the president of the CBF, according to Brazilian media reports. Something of an irony, if true, since Del Nero was happily photographed with FIFA president Gianni Infantino on his recent trip to Brazil. The picture was posted on Facebook sites.
Del Nero is under investigation from the FBI for alleged conspiracy, money laundering and electronic fraud related to CBF marketing contracts about the Brazilian Cup, the Copa America and the Copa Libertadores. In the last two years the CBF president hasn’t left Brazil for fear that he may get arrested in a territory that has an extradition agreement with the US.
FIFA’s ethics committee has been investigating the Brazilian for corruption since late 2015.
In theory, the CBF, presiding over the Brazilian domestic league and the Brazilian national team, doesn’t need FIFA’s funding and development aid as much as other, smaller FA’s might, but the CBF has been slow in proposing reforms, let alone in enforcing possible reforms.
CBF’s general-secretary Walter Feldman has downplayed the situation. He met with FIFA’s general-secretary Fatma Diouf Samoura, but the encounter was merely formal.
The legacy fund is earmarked to build new training complexes across Brazil and to help develop the local women’s game and the grassroots.
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