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Barcelona (AFP) – The president of the Spanish Football League, Javier Tebas, said on Monday that the country’s first popular game is going through its worst moment ever because of the Barcelona refereeing corruption case.
Prosecutors last week brought corruption charges against the Catalan club after uncovering payments of more than 7.3 million euros ($7.8 million) to a company owned by a former refereeing chief earlier this year.
Barcelona responded by saying that it paid Jose Maria Enriques Negrera, a former referee and former vice-president of the refereeing committee of the local federation of the game between 1994 and 2018, to obtain reports and advice related to refereeing.
In this context, Tebas told Movistar Vamos, “Yes, (it’s the worst moment) I remember.”
He added, “The problem we have is the worst. There are payments approved by Barcelona to the vice-president of the federation’s arbitration committee, and this is something abnormal.”
And he added, “It is understood that tension has arisen. Our football reputation is at stake. I am ashamed. We have no explanation from Barcelona.”
Barca president Joan Laporta spoke at Monday’s event, stressing that he would defend his team against “attacks”. Laporta appeared emotional during his speech and said it was not weakness, but instead showed his willingness to confront his club’s critics.
He said “I don’t think I got emotional out of weakness, I get emotional because I really want to face all the scoundrels who defame our badge” and “there are vicious attacks staining our club badge, which have nothing to do with reality”.
“You can be sure that the board of directors that I have the honor of chairing will defend it with all our might,” he stressed.
The Spanish newspaper El Pais reported on Monday that former Barcelona coaches Luis Enrique and Ernesto Valverde will be called as witnesses in the trial proceedings.
For its part, Real Madrid, the Spanish champions, said on Sunday that it would appear as an “affected party” in the case once it moved forward.
In addition to the club and Enriques Negrera, two former club presidents, Josep Maria Bartomeu and Sandro Rosell, also face the same corruption charge.
On a sporting level, Barcelona face no immediate danger because the governing bodies of Spanish, European and world football have a five-year statute of limitations, Tebas said.
On the criminal level, the accused can face up to four years in prison. Sanctions against the club could range from “suspension of activity… to complete dissolution as a company,” Alberto Palomar, a law professor at Madrid’s Carlos III University, told AFP.
© 2023 AFP
