Warner promises to make Blatter email public
Reuters - Friday 03 June 2011, 15:00
PORT OF SPAIN - Suspended FIFA
vice-president Jack Warner has promised to release an email he
sent to the organisation's president Sepp Blatter after the
controversial meeting of Caribbean football chiefs at the centre
of the sport's bribery allegations.
Trinidadian Warner organised a meeting of the Caribbean
Football Union with then FIFA presidential candidate Mohamed
Bin Hammam which became the subject of the cash-for-votes
scandal which has rocked football's governing body.
Both Warner and Qatari Bin Hammam have been suspended from
all football activities pending a full inquiry from FIFA's
Ethics Committee in Zurich.
Warner, who on his return to Port of Spain on Thursday night
was greeted by hundreds of supporters including local political
figures, said he would read out the email at a public event at
his political constituency on Sunday.
"When you come on Sunday... I will read for all of you the
email I sent to Mr Blatter immediately following the meeting in
Port of Spain. The email I sent to Mr Blatter is crystal clear
and it tells you what happened at the meeting and of course what
transpired," Warner told reporters.
"That email went to FIFA, has never been made public and
Sunday it will be," Warner added.
FLOWER GARLAND
Warner, who is Transport Minister in Trinidad & Tobago, wore
a garland of flowers around his neck that he had been given by
cheering supporters at the airport.
The 68-year-old has lost control, for the moment, of the
CONCACAF confederation of football in North and Central America
and the Caribbean, after his suspension, but he said he had done
nothing wrong.
"This thing is not so much against Jack Warner. This is a
matter against the Caribbean.
"What they have done is to accuse the entire Caribbean of
being dishonest, what they have done is to tell the entire
Caribbean that they are capable of being bribed, what they have
done has affected Caribbean integration in football in the
Caribbean. So it's not Jack Warner alone, it's bigger than Jack
Warner.
"I spent 20 years building that and nobody, nobody will come
overnight and try to disintegrate the Caribbean and I remain
steadfast that Caribbean integration must remain intact," he
said.
Warner rejected calls by the opposition party and one of the
key partners in the coalition government for him to step down
from his ministerial position pending the outcome of the
investigation into the bribery allegations made against him.
"I would be the first to step down if I believe I should. I
don't think it is the correct thing to do at this stage. It is
premature," he said.