March 3 – Spain’s referees have jointly defended their reputation and profession in the wake of the burgeoning scandal involving Barcelona’s alleged payment of £1.4 million to a company run by a former referee who at the time was acting as one of their top representatives at the Spanish FA.
Barca denies any wrongdoing and says the money paid to DASNIL 95, owned by Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira, between 2016-18, was for consultancy advice. But a Spanish state prosecutor is probing the venture after the country’s tax authorities got involved.
Several hundred active and former referees and referee assistants attended the first news conference given by the Spanish football federation since the scandal was broken by Spain’s Cadena SER radio station on February 15.
“We want to make clear that no one has more at stake than we do in assuring that justice is served,” said referee José Sánchez on behalf of the entire body of match officials.
Negreira was vice-president of the Spanish football federation’s refereeing committee until 2018 but referees who were active at the time insist they never received any pressure from him or other officials.
Sanchez said he and his colleagues hoped that the “alleged acts by a person that in his time formed part of this house won’t stain our image and the honour of this great body.”
While not confirming the exact figures, Barcelona has acknowledged the payment to Enríquez. The club has hired an independent firm to carry out its own investigation and is expected to give a more detailed account once that is concluded.
But with the plot thickening, former top-flight Spanish referee Xavier Estrada Fernandez has filed a criminal lawsuit in a Barcelona court against Negreira’s company for alleged sporting fraud, according to local reports.
While the consultancy work payments, which included refereeing reports, are the only ones being investigated by the tax office, it has also been alleged that Barca paid Negreira over $7 million dating back to at least 2001.
According to Catalan tv, Fernandez believes Negreira’s role “had or could have had” influence over referees. Moreover, that there was “an obvious profit motive” .
La Liga cannot hand down sporting sanctions over the Negreira revelations because statute of limitations laws in Spain make it possible to punish clubs only within three years of any offences.
However, LaLiga president Javier Tebas said earlier this week that Barca president Joan Laporta should resign if he is unable to offer a reasonable explanation regarding the payments.
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