Image via WikipediaThe government is backing a shakeup of Greece's soccer league as prosecutors begin an investigation into allegations of corruption and attempted match-fixing. The government has requested the Greek Football Association intervene and take authority from the Superleague, the body that currently runs the country's top league with little regulation.
The GFA has also been asked to consider using foreign referees for certain domestic games.
"The Superleague is not suitable to organize the championship, given the current circumstances, the way it works and the behavior of some of its senior members," the government's general secretary for sport, Panos Bitsaxis, wrote. "The government respects the self-governing nature of football. ... But the government will take the decisions necessary to restore the credibility of professional football."
He warned that state-controlled betting company OPAP could withdraw funding for soccer unless serious reforms are made.
Last Friday, prosecutors began hearing testimony from referees after a prominent lawyer handed judicial authorities what he said were taped conversations providing evidence of attempts to bribe a Greek referee and others.
The lawyer said the allegations included a failed attempt to influence an Aug. 5 Europa League match between Maccabi Tel Aviv and Greek league leader Olympiakos.
Olympiakos flatly denied the allegations, while other clubs applauded the government's initiative.
AEK Athens wrote an open letter to Prime Minister George Papandreou, comparing the soccer scandal to the lack of public accountability that helped create Greece's financial crisis. "Professional Greek football is rotten, an area in which parasitic and criminal elements are served by an orgy of corruption with the complete inability of football institutions to react," AEK wrote.
"It is a product of the pathologies of Greek society that have brought us to the state of collapse that we live in today: lawlessness, nepotism, money laundering, tax dodging, corruption, blackmail, and the assurance of impunity provided by a web of diffused complicity."
Investigative magistrate Constantine Simitzoglou, heading the soccer corruption probe, is due to hear testimony Monday from more acting and former referees, sports reporters and the head of the Greek FA, Sofoklis Pilavios.
Meanwhile, the prosecutor investigating the ''Calciopoulos'' match-fixing scandal is hoping to get a better picture of the affair dogging Greek soccer after reports suggested on March 14 that besides the CDs containing audio material there are DVDs, too, that contain precious footage of behind-the-scenes dealings.
According to a number of newspaper reports, the original recordings that prominent lawyer Alexis Kougias presented on March 9 and incriminate Olympiakos Piraeus president Vangelis Marinakis and Olympiakos Volou owner Achilleas Beos were made using a hidden camera.
The material was reportedly recorded at an office that served as the ''headquarters'' of the network that allegedly controlled football referees, and unnamed sources suggest that there are DVDs that add pictures to the audio unveiled by Kougias. The audio of the recorded material was edited into the CDs that Kougias reportedly submitted to the prosecutor investigating the scandal.
The same reports add that prosecutor Constantinos Simitzoglou is aware of the video tapes' existence and is trying to secure them for the benefit of the investigation. Kougias has also claimed there is a third CD containing even more significant revelations, allegedly from a taped telephone conversation.
On Monday, former referee Sotiris Vorgias, who was among those to blow the whistle on the Greek answer to Italy's Calciopoli scandal, spoke of a second match official who has suffered pressure from the same ring, after Giorgos Daloukas. He said Beos paid a visit to that official on September 29, 2009 and threatened him, but Vorgias did not explain why.
A Greek radio station identified that match official as Spyros Papadakos, a former ref who at the time was a member of the Central Refereeing Commission (KED).
Vorgias further alleged that Hellenic Football Federation president Pilavios met with Daloukas after the latter testified to the prosecutor on March 11 and that some people are promising Daloukas a post with the national team in order to stop him from giving names.
Beos said he will sue Kougias and former Panathinaikos president Nikolas Pateras, accusing the latter of being the mastermind behind the recordings and the editing of the CDs, which have been published on the Internet.
Source: AP, Kathimerini
Posts
