A complaint from Daniel Vila anticipated Grondona’s activity 10 years ago

Julio Grondona’s funeral was on August 1, 2014, when Alejandro Burzaco, the former CEO of Torneos detained in the United States, gathered the region’s top football executives in a bathroom on the Ezeiza property of the AFA. Without fear of an unwanted witness, he looked at them and asked, “How are we going to distribute what matches Don Julio?”

The particular anecdote was told by Burzaco himself during one of the Fifa Gate trial hearings held in New York. And recreated in the Amazon Prime series El Presidente, which reviews several of the football corruption scandals that came to light after the death of the historic AFA president.

Grondona was a fundamental part of this dark business plot and recently it was corroborated by a confession that until a few years ago was unimaginable. Executives at Swiss bank Julius Baer (BJB) have admitted paying nearly $ 30 million in bribes from media company executives to secure television rights, including Burzaco himself.

A leader was encouraged to denounce these negotiations when Grondona was alive and in absolute power. It was the businessman and former president of Independiente Rivadavia de Mendoza, Daniel Vila. Not only did he point the finger at corruption scandals in public, but he also went to federal court and denounced them after the “El Show del Fútbol” program, then hosted by Alejandro Fantino, aired a camera. hidden where Grondona could be observed talking about suitcases. , banknotes and dollars.

“As far as I was able to investigate I found 5 accounts in the name of Julio Grondona, his children, his wife and a few businesses that they had in different banks overseas with almost $ 17 million. I said and denounced it four years ago, but justice has only moved here», Reconstituted Vila in an interview with Luis Novaresio in 2015 and the fragments of which can be seen in this note.

Corruption weariness and his passion for football led him to become the visible face of the dream of leaders who believed that a better and modern AFA could be built, far from the darkness that characterized it for nearly three decades at the height of the best. institutions around the world.

He had the courage to face Grondona in the elections. He got votes from clubs across the country to move him, but powerful partners “Sarandí’s hardware store” had been keen to prevent him from leading Argentinian football. In light of recently known facts and evidence, leaders who once mocked images of Vila wanting to enter the AFA after winning elections in an assembly overseen by notaries, must now be sorry.

This public, political, judicial and sporting challenge was not free for Vila. His family and his club supporters know it too, who have suffered strange arbitrations and decisions against him in recent years. Not all is happening for Grondona, despite her ring saying otherwise.

The 30 million Grondona

Swiss bank Julius Baer (BJB) has admitted to paying the late former AFA President and FIFA Senior Vice President Julio Grondona $ 30 million in bribes to FIFA-Gate and will have to pay a New York Justice fined $ 79 million more, investigating prosecutors informed.

The corruption scheme went through Argentinian Jorge Luis Arzuaga, a former head of relations with the BJB who worked in the bank’s offices in Montevideo and Zurich, and who pleaded guilty in June 2017 and was convicted by the judge for this reason. Chen to three years of probation in November 2020.

Arzuaga admitted to receiving payments to BJB sub-accounts from South American media companies from February 2013 to May 2015 – when the FBI raid took place which arrested several of the South American executives at the Baur Au hotel. Lake Zurich, where they were staying on the occasion of the FIFA Congress which was to re-elect Joseph Blatter as president of the entity.

These payments, as the BJB admitted, amounted to $ 36,368,400 in illegal transactions that were facilitated by its employees who then turned a blind eye to suspicious transactions that they needed to report to the entity immediately, as the New York Justice report argues. And clarifies that this office “will hold accountable companies or individuals who use the American banking system for purposes of corruption”.

According to the confession, the bank was already aware that the accounts of Arzuaga’s clients were linked to international football and that they posed a high risk of corruption, but a top BJB official ordered that the opening of these accounts be expedited by because of the profit they represented. . . .

Burzaco, former head of tournaments and competitions, pleaded guilty to conspiracy, extortion and other crimes in November 2015, while Grondona is mentioned in the case as “Lord of Soccer Number 1” because he died before start of the legal process.

According to the report, Grondona received $ 30 million corresponding to the granting of broadcast rights for the 2018, 2022, 2026 and 2030 World Cups, of which 25 million was transferred to a BJB sub-account.

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