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The public confession of regret optant Dejan Veljkovic (51) has caused a first shock wave in football. Around the turn of the year, some fifty administrators, trainers and brokers will be told that the court wants them to appear in criminal court.
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Pieter Huyberechts
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Which drivers were guilty of money laundering? Who engaged in active or private corruption? And who, according to the federal prosecutor’s office, was part of a criminal organization? These are the three crucial questions that will be answered in operation Clean Hands in the coming weeks. Three years after the affair broke out with arrests, house searches and nightly interrogations, it is gradually D-day for (ex-) club directors of Genk, Anderlecht, Club Brugge, Lokeren, Mechelen, Oud-Heverlee Leuven, Waasland-Beveren, Standard and the Koninklijke Belgian Football Association. Mogi Bayat, that other ‘super broker’, will also come into view. So far, he has largely remained unaffected, but that does not mean anything criminally. Bayat is considered an absolute pivotal figure in operation Clean Hands.
secret notebooks
According to our information, the federal prosecutor’s office is currently finalizing the final claim, the document listing all figures from the Belgian football world whose investigation has shown that they have committed criminal offences. At least, according to the investigators who have been investigating the secret accounting of regret optant Dejan Veljkovic since October 10, 2018. His notebooks have proved crucial to the investigation.
In addition, the investigators conducted many dozens of interrogations and all cellphones and laptops of club directors, trainers, players and agents were sifted through and compared with all useful contracts that they took with them in the offices of the football clubs. The result is an immense criminal file that puts a bomb under Belgian football.
Convocation letter
By the turn of the year, the final claim must be added to the Clean Hands criminal file. Then it will become clear whether Veljkovic’s statement is correct, namely that “95 percent of all board members whose paths he crossed are corrupt”. The next step is then a council chamber, which must decide whether there are ‘sufficient objections’ against each of them. About fifty trainers, brokers, board members and relatives can most likely expect a letter of summons for the court in the spring of 2022. And then the last masks fall off.
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