Sepp Blatter and Two Cronies Paid Themselves $81 Million In World Cup Bonuses
By Ty Duffy
Swiss police raided FIFA’s offices as part of an ongoing investigation. The investigation revealed World Cup bonuses and assorted payments made to former FIFA President Sepp Blatter ($33.8 million), former FIFA Secretary General Jerome Valcke ($33.2 million) and former FIFA Deputy Secretary General Markus Kattner ($13.8 million) totaling more than $81 million.
Those payments were made in the last five years. Both Blatter and Valcke have received multiple-year bans from soccer. Kattner was fired in May. As we uncover more of FIFA dealings, the only thing incredible is these crooks found the time to orchestrate so much graft between tinking champagne glasses and jetting around the world to lavish resorts.
Besides enriching top executives, FIFA spent its World Cup riches on necessary expenditures such as a $198 million underground museum and spending nearly $30 million on its own Hollywood film, that made a whopping $607 in the U.S.
Such funds could have been spent on more noble efforts. FIFA could have paid taxes on its profits in Brazil, which spent $3 billion building stadiums for 2014 now housing buses and collecting bird shit.
FIFA could also have increased its investment in the women’s game, through greater promotion or perhaps helping ensure salaries for female professionals eclipse the poverty line. Blatter’s bonuses alone were more than double the $15 million allotted for participants at the 2015 Women’s World Cup, a tournament Blatter could not attend for fear of being indicted.