The former treasurer of the German Federation reveals that votes were bought to win the 2006 World Cup

The former treasurer of German Football Association (DFB) Hors R. Schmidt said in an internal investigation that “it should be assumed” that the organizers of the 2006 world championship used several million euros to buy votes to get the tournament place, according to information from the magazine. ‘Der Spiegel’.

Schmidtincluding former presidents of DFB Wolfgang Niersbach and Theo Zwanziger He is currently facing court for alleged tax fraud of around 6.7 million euros that was declared as operating expenses and used to pay off a loan granted to him by the businessman. Robert Louis-Dreyfus in Franz Beckenbauer.

Franz Beckenbauer, responsible for the German candidacy and later became president of World Cup Organizing Committeehe said Schmidt that the money was first received by the Qatari official Mohamed Bin Haman and that he could not dispose that part of it had been passed in controversy Jack Warner of Concacaf.

Four days before the award of the World Cup venue, he added, Beckenbauer sign an agreement with Warner which guarantees him and his federation, Trinidad and TobagoI’m a millionaire.

The official version, initially, was that the money was used to pay for an inauguration gala that ultimately did not take place.

Niersbachwho was the general secretary at the time of the events, and Zwanziger say they made the payment to pay off the debt believing the money was used to pay off the gala organization.

The declaration of Schmidtt was conducted in 2021 in the presence of the then president of DFB Fritz Keller and the former director of the criminal police of Mecklenburg-Pomerania (northeast Germany), Ingmar Weitermeier, who owns a company where DFB He ordered internal investigations into the case.

The protocol, to which ‘Der Spiegel’ had access, was never authorized by Schmidtbut it has the signature of Keller As a Witness.