Izuchukwu OkosiBarcelona president Joan Laporta is facing investigations for suspected bribery by Spanish prosecutors that dates back to 2001 in a period that the club dominated Spanish football.
Laporta is one of seven people who are being investigated over payments of £6.3m (€7.3m) made by Barcelona to former senior referee Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira.
Barcelona and other parties being investigated in the case deny any wrongdoing.
The Prosecutors are thus investigating payments made between 2001 and 2018 to Negreira and his company Dasnil 95.
Negreira is a former referee and was vice-president of Spain’s referees’ committee between 1994 and 2018 and wielded a lot of influence as an official.
Barcelona are consequently charged of corruption, breach of trust and false accounting. The Blaugrana insists the payments were for consulting work including refereeing reports.
In March, UEFA appointed ethics and disciplinary investigators to look into the case.
Barcelona were allowed to play in the Champions League this season but UEFA said in July “a future decision on admission/exclusion from UEFA club competitions is reserved.”
Barcelona won nine Spanish titles between 2001 and 2018.
“Joan Laporta is one of the most powerful men in world football. He’s the president of one of the biggest clubs in world football, Barcelona, but [on Wednesday] he was informed by a Spanish judge that he’s been placed under formal investigation for suspected bribery.
“He is one of seven people who’s being investigated over payments totalling £6.3m that were made by Barcelona over a period of 17 years from the club to a former referee called Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira.
“Negreira wasn’t just any old normal referee, he was a senior referee and also for a long period he was a vice president of Spain’s referees’ committee. Now that is the committee that allocates referees for games in Spain, so he was a very powerful referee, a senior figure.
“The question that is being asked is why were Barcelona paying him £6.3m over 17 years?
“All the people who are being investigated and Barcelona deny any wrongdoing whatsoever. They say there is an innocent explanation for these payments – in Spain it is quite normal for clubs to pay referees and former referees for advice about technical matters because they want to tell their players how referees act, how they apply the law and that is why they employ these referees on an ad hoc basis and make these payments for technical reports.
“Now the prosecutors are not buying this and that is why we saw last month the offices of the referees’ committee being raided by Spanish police who were looking for documents relating to this case.
“What the prosecutors believe may have happened from what they have said in court is that Barcelona were getting some kind of benefit from these payments and these benefits were to the detriment of other clubs in Spain.”
There are expectations that the investigations could also delve onto their UEFA Champions League victory in Paris in 2006 at the expense of Arsenal.
Izuchukwu Okosi is a Nigerian sports and entertainment journalist with two decades of experience in the media industry having begun his media journey in 2002 as an intern at Mundial Sports International (MSI) and Africa Independent Television (AIT), owners of Daar Communications Plc.
In October 2004, Okosi joined Complete Communications Limited, publishers of Complete Sports newspaper and Complete Football magazine as a reporter and later script writer for the Complete Sports studio.
He worked there for 13 years until October 2017.
Okosi also worked various times as Correspondent, Content creator and Editor at Sports Market International Magazine, Opera News, All Nigeria Soccer Media and Iconic Media Watch.
He also undertook freelance writing gigs for some local and international organizations.
Okosi is a member of the Actors Guild of Nigeria (AGN), Association of Movie Producers (AMP), Association of Voiceover Artistes of Nigeria (AVOA), Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN) and Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ).
He has been part of cast in some Nollywood movies and radio dramas including Blood Money 2, Scores To Settle, Dead End 2, Another Campus Tale and Battle Line.
Aside mainstream media and the entertainment industry, he has interests in scouting/unearthing of talents in the sports and creative sectors, exports business and property development.
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