Fifa’s Jack Warner ‘to reveal all’

Former Fifa vice president Jack Warner has said in a TV address that he will reveal all he knows about corruption at the world football body.

Warner, who said he feared for his life, also said he could link Fifa officials to general elections in his native Trinidad and Tobago in 2010.

He is one of the 14 people charged by the US over corruption at Fifa.

Another top Fifa official and key witness, Chuck Blazer, had admitted accepting bribes.

The admissions came in a newly released transcript of Blazer's guilty plea from 2013, as part of a wide-ranging US criminal case that has engulfed Fifa and led President Sepp Blatter to resign.

The US justice department alleges the 14 people charged worldwide accepted bribes and kickbacks estimated at more than $150m (£97m) over a 24-year period.

Four others had already been charged, including Blazer.

Jack Warner, 72, resigned from all football activity in 2011 amid bribery allegations and later stepped down as Trinidad and Tobago's security minister due to a fraud inquiry.

'Avalanche'

Warner, a key figure in the deepening scandal, said he had given lawyers documents outlining the links between Fifa, its funding, himself and the 2010 election in Trinidad and Tobago.

He said the transactions also included Fifa chief Sepp Blatter

"I will no longer keep secrets for them who actively seek to destroy the country," he said in a paid political broadcast on Wednesday evening entitled "The gloves are off".

He promised an "avalanche" of revelations to come, speaking to his supporters at a rally later the same day.

Warner, who denies charges against him and faces extradition to the US, was released on bail after handing himself in to police in the Trinidad and Tobago capital of Port of Spain last week.

He resigned from Fifa's executive committee in 2011 amid allegations he had bribed his Caribbean associates.

His address came hours after the details of Blazer's 2013 plea bargain came to light, including the admission that he and other officials had accepted bribes in connection with the 2010 World Cup bid awarded to South Africa.

Separately on Thursday, South African police said they had opened a preliminary investigation into allegations its national football association paid a $10m bribe to host the tournament - a claim the authorities deny.

Chuck Blazer's admissions

He and others on Fifa's executive committee took bribes from 2004 until 2011 in exchange for backing South Africa to host the 2010 World Cup.

He agreed with a co-conspirator to facilitate a bribe in Morocco for its bid to host 1998 tournament - eventually awarded to France.

He and others accepted bribes in connection with broadcast and other rights for Concacaf's Gold Cup tournament in 1996, 1998, 2000, 2002 and 2003.

Other admissions include US tax evasion

Blazer was the second highest official in Fifa's North and Central American and Caribbean region (Concacaf) from 1990 to 2011 and also served on Fifa's executive committee between 1997 and 2013.

Seven of the 14 charged were top Fifa officials arrested in Zurich, Switzerland, as they awaited the Fifa congress last week. Two were vice-presidents.

In addition to the US case, Swiss authorities have launched a criminal investigation into how the 2018 and 2022 World Cups were allocated.

A law enforcement official quoted by Reuters says the FBI also plans to extend the investigation to how Fifa awarded Russia and Qatar hosting rights. Both countries have denied any wrongdoing in the bidding process.

The authorities in Qatar, which is hosting the 2022 event, say they are confident they will not be stripped of their right to host.

Meanwhile, UK Culture Secretary John Whittingdale says England is ready to host if Qatar is stripped of the World Cup in 2022. There is a "strong case" for re-running the 2018 and 2022 bids if there is evidence of corruption, he adds.

Sepp Blatter, who resigned earlier this week, was greeted with a standing ovation at the Fifa headquarters in Zurich on Wednesday.

Announcing the surprise move a day earlier, he said it appeared that the mandate he had been given to continue as president in the Fifa congress vote last Friday did "not seem to be supported by everybody in the world of football".