Fifa corruption scandal: Morocco won 2010 World Cup before votes were 'Rigged'

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Morocco actually won the ballot to host the 2010 World Cup before votes were "deliberately miscounted" and it was awarded to South Africa, according to extraordinary new claims of corruption at Fifa.

Secret video tapes, allegedly first shown to the governing body five years ago and published this weekend by the Sunday Times, reportedly show the then-Fifa executive committee member Ismail Bhamjee making the claims to an undercover reporter.

Bhamjee alleges that he discussed the ballot with colleagues and realised that, based on whom they all voted for, "we found out that actually Morocco won by two votes". He tells the reporter that officials, who tallied the votes in secret, could have "deliberately miscounted" before adding "Please, this is very secret."

South Africa denied the claims. The country's sports ministry has in the past week also denied allegations from US investigators that it paid $10 million to the former Fifa executive Jack Warner to secure votes from Caribbean delegates.

 

 

The Sunday Times reported that it had handed the tapes to Fifa executives including its president, Sepp Blatter, five years ago, alleging that the organisation's highest-ranking officials were made aware of the claims.

In a statement to the newspaper, Fifa said: "It cannot have escaped even the Sunday Times' attention that these matters are being investigated by the proper authorities, i.e. government agencies not newspapers. And Fifa is fully cooperating with these investigations."

The undercover tapes also appear to show Bhamjee claiming that Morocco paid a bribe of more than $1 million to Warner, then the president of Concacaf. He alleges Warner changed his vote at the last minute to South Africa "because they offered him more money".