Futebol

by Alex Bellos

  One of the principal reasons the CBF is held in such low esteem is that it has proved incapable of organising a credible national league. In 1989, a new president took over with the promise that he would put football's house in order. Ricardo Teixeira, then aged forty-two, was a financier with no previous involvement in sports administration. Yet he had impeccable family connections. Teixeira was married to the only child of João Havelange.

  Havelange is the spiritual figurehead of the Brazilian sporting establishment. A former athlete – he competed twice at the Olympic Games, as a swimmer in 1936 and in the water polo team in 1952 – he has dominated football for more than forty years. He was president of the CBF's precursor, the CBD, between 1958 and 1974. That year he became FIFA'S president, a position he held until 1998. Havelange is still an imposing character; the strongest-looking eighty-four-year-old you have ever seen.

  Brazil is unique in being represented by a football confederation rather than a federation. This is a consequence of the state-based way the sport originated. Each state has a federation, which votes on the CBF president. The system distorts power since all states have the same power of vote, even though, for example, São Paulo is more than a hundred times as populous as Roraima. Teixeira was elected after a campaign that involved paying some of the poorer federations with his own money. In power, he continued the nepotistic atmosphere started by his father-in-law, appointing his uncle, a chemist, and his cousin to prominent CBF positions.

  It was not long before Teixeira became a widely despised figure. In 1993, Pelé gave a voice to the prevailing anti-Teixeira sentiment. In an interview to Brazilian Playboy, he claimed that the CBF was corrupt.

  Havelange retaliated on behalf of the family and excluded Pelé from the launch ceremony of the 1994 World Cup – a move which attracted worldwide condemnation as a petty, dictatorial act.

  The incident, however, that confirmed Teixeira's unpopularity occurred immediately after Brazil won the 1994 World Cup. When the squad arrived back from the United States, the plane was carrying fifteen tonnes of baggage, mostly of electronic goods bought by players and the CBF entourage. Teixeira demanded that the products pass through Rio airport customs without inspection, therefore avoiding tax. He argued that there were crowds of supporters waiting to see the team and there would be a safety risk if they delayed the planned victory procession. He made several threats to customs officers, encouraging players to do the same, saying that they would throw their medals away and refuse to parade if they were not let through immediately. The matter was only solved when the government in Brasilia intervened and liberated the baggage without inspection. After public outrage, the CBF supplied a list of items afterwards for which they paid duty, although the list contained items that only weighed just over one tonne – leaving fourteen tonnes unaccounted for.

  In 1996 Ricardo Teixeira signed the Nike deal. It might have been for the good of Brazilian football, yet Teixeira's refusal to make the contract public aroused many doubts. Suspicions were vindicated when the clause guaranteeing an average of five 'Nike friendlies' a year became known.

  A few weeks into the CPI investigations Teixeira told the press that he had already changed the 'Nike friendlies' clause. He admitted that he made a mistake because he forgot that if Brazil did not win the 1998 World Cup then its diary would be full of World Cup qualifiers. In 1996, when the contract came into effect, Brazil were exempt from qualifiers as champions.

  Teixeira renegotiated to reduce the number of 'Nike friendlies' to two a year. He did this seven months previously, but, in keeping with the CBF's policy of non-transparency, did not make it public. Why such secrecy?

  Ricardo Teixeira's arch enemy is Juca Kfouri, the journalist who interviewed Pelé for Playboy and to whom the Nike contract was first leaked. On the basis of these scoops alone, Juca is Brazil's most influential sportswriter. He is also the most prolific: he has a daily backpage column in Lance!, a daily weekday football show on national radio and a football television progamme on Sundays. What most sets him apart from his peers is that he is essentially a campaigning journalist. It is as if Paul Foot presents Match of the Day, commentates on Radio Five Live and has a football column in the Sun.

  I travel to São Paulo to speak to Juca about the parliamentary investigations. I meet him in the studios of Radio CBN shortly before he goes on air at 8pm. We walk into a soundproof studio and shut the door behind us. Juca is tall and professorial, with a big forehead and brushed-back black hair that shines in light curves. When he speaks he scowls slightly and leans forward with a learned nod. 'Brazil is in transition,' he begins. 'We only became a democracy recently – in 1985. But the last thing to change in this country will be the structure of football. It is reactionary. It is corrupt. It is profoundly corrupt.'

  Juca's fight against the Brazilian football establishment has made him a distinguished national figure. His reputation goes beyond Brazil's borders. When, in 1998, he was refused a World Cup press pass, he became an international cause celebre. After FIFA relented, he received messages that Ricardo Teixeira would send his son – a martial arts black belt – to beat him up. I tell him that I find it odd that the country's best-known sports journalist is so militantly against the footballing powers. 'Someone had to do it,' he replies. 'For a long time I felt very alone.'

  If there is a weakness in Juca's position it is that Ricardo Teixeira, irrespective of whether he is corrupt or not, has presided over the Brazilian national team's best results in more than thirty years. Brazil were world champions in 1994 and were second in 1998. Not since 1958 and 1962 has Brazil played in two consecutive World Cup finals. Does he not deserve some credit?

  'The victory in 1994 wasn't like the others,' Juca replies. 'Brazil won because Roberto Baggio missed a penalty. And you can't forget about the [controversial] performance of the Costa Rican ref against Holland [in the quarter-final].' Juca believes that Brazil have triumphed in spite of the cartolas. 'When the national team starts a game with Ricardo Teixeira in charge they are already losing 1-0.'

  Juca adds that the good results have, if anything, made it easier for the CBF to get away with unacceptable behaviour. 'In Brazil there is still this ideology of 'rouba mas faz' – it's OK to steal if you get things done. In football this is stretched to the most far-reaching consequences. Everything is forgotten in the light of victory. I have always said that God put the best players here and the worst bosses to compensate.'

  I ask what his opinion is of the football CPIs. I suggest that they are farcical. What is the benefit for democracy of directionless sessions asking Ronaldo who marked Zidane? He disagrees strongly. He believes the CPIs must be seen as part of Brazil's slow process of democratisation. 'Independent of their final results,' he argues, 'the simple fact that they have submitted the cartolas to questioning is a service to the citizen. These people were never submitted to any kind of interrogation. There is an absolute absence of laws.'

  I sit through Juca's radio show. It is very good. He is not a natural broadcaster, but he makes up for a somewhat forced delivery by his intellectual weight and an unrivalled contacts book. The evening I am there Pelé is in Rome being presented with FIFA's award for 'Player of the Century'. Juca calls Pelé up on his mobile and chats to him live. The two men are very affectionate with each other.

  Pelé says: 'So Juca, I have a question for you now. When will you write my biography?'

  Juca replies good-naturedly: 'When Pelé has time!'

  Pelé and Juca have been strong allies since their Playboy interview. Pelé suffered for taking on Teixeira. His sports marketing companies were practically frozen out of business. Pelé's feud with Teixeira intensified when the ex-footballer was made Extraordinary Sports Minister in 1995. In trying to reform football legislation Pelé was attacking the interests that kept Teixeira in power. Pelé became the figurehead of football's 'modernisers' – and Juca Kfouri was his most articulate mouthpiece and confidant.

  In February 2001 Juca has another exc
lusive. It lands like a bombshell. Pelé and Teixeira are calling a truce. The most high profile vendetta in Brazilian football is over.

  At first I am unsure what it means.

  I call Aldo. He is very angry. He believes the pact is a backroom deal to save both their skins, since Pelé's business partner, Helio Viana, is also being investigated by the Nike CPI. Aldo is not the only one who is furious. The press is unforgiving. It comes down harshly on Brazil's formerly untouchable hero. 'The union of Pelé and Ricardo Teixeira is the biggest stab in the back that those of us fighting for ethics in sport could receive . . . Pelé has let us all down . . . He has sold his soul to the devil,' writes José Trajano, a respected sports journalist, in Lance!.

  I go to see Juca again. He is clearly devastated. He tells me that 'the King' has been exposed as a commoner. 'It was a terrible let down. And a great surprise. For eight years Pelé had an essential role in the denouncing of corruption. When we were on our knees, without oxygen, he gave us his hand.'

  Ricardo Teixeira and Pelé: Friends again

  I ask Juca if he has broken off his friendship. 'Personally it resulted in a distancing, and I have told him that I will not write his biography any more, for obvious reasons. How would I write this chapter?'

  My sympathies are with Juca and the 'modernisers', but I am beginning to doubt all their accusations. If corruption is so widespread, I ask him, why is it so difficult to prove? 'This is typical of the democratic process, which is slow,' he replies. 'And it is also typical of Brazilian justice, where things are slower still. But when you read the CPI report it is stunning that these people are not arrested.'

  ***

  In May 2001, Aldo's investigation into the Nike-CBF contract is completed, after fifty-nine separate hearings totalling 237 hours and involving 125 witnesses. Unable to pin any dirt on Nike, the original villain, the focus became the cartolas, principally at the CBF. Aldo may have wasted time on silly questions with Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos, but serious progress was made in less high-profile sessions. The 686-page report lists thirty-three people who it alleges have committed crimes. Ricardo Teixeira is accused of thirteen, including making bad loans, tax evasion, withholding information, giving misleading information, lying on his tax form, and using CBF money for his private needs. Pelé's partner Helio Viana is accused of five.

  Even though the trigger for the inquiry was whether or not Nike forced Ronaldo to play in the World Cup final, the report uncovered a different cover-up. The real scandal of the Nike deal was what Ricardo Teixeira did with the money. It may have been the largest contract signed with a national team, but accountants looking through the books said that the CBF was so badly managed that were it a business it would be declared insolvent.

  From 1997 to 2000, the CBF's revenue quadrupled, but it did not pay off its debts. Ricardo Teixeira, however, did very well out of it. He and his directors received pay rises of more than 300 per cent. Meanwhile, spending on football decreased from a 55 per cent share of the budget to 37 per cent.

  The report reveals how Teixeira used the CBF for his personal gain. He sold milk from his ranch to the CBF, and hosted CBF events at his restaurant and nightclub. The report also shows how the CBF shamelessly bought power and influence. In 1998, for example, the CBF gave all-expenses-paid trips for five senior judges to travel to the World Cup. But perhaps the most suspicious outlay was the travel budget. In 2000, the CBF spent $16 million on travel – enough for 1,663 first-class returns from Rio to Australia. Who were they paying for?

  I read the document closely and find a mine of suspicious payments. In 2000, for example, the CBF paid £100,000 to a Brasilia newspaper for an advert. The ad never appeared, but a fortnight later the paper printed an exclusive interview with Ricardo Teixeira.

  A few weeks later I meet Aldo again. He is in Rio to give a talk at the Superior War School on 'Authoritarian and Totalitarian Experience in Republican Brazil'. We dine at the Hotel Glória, a classy 1920s building near the city centre. I order the vegetarian option. When it arrives, underneath a thick layer of mushrooms there are two large breasts of chicken.

  I ask Aldo if he is happy with the conclusions of the CPI. I suggest that it failed in its primary objective, which was to find abuses of sovereignty in the Nike contract. The swoosh gets off scot-free. 'The report was very good,' Aldo insists. 'The report was a criticism of the entry of the market into football.'

  He does not describe Teixeira as a villain, but as a victim of capitalism. I had almost forgotten that Aldo's motives were ideological. Marxist jargon is creeping into his patter. 'Corruption is a consequence of the shock of capitalism,' he says. 'Corruption is like a skin disease. It is the most visible, but it is not the fundamental problem.'

  Ricardo Teixeira, he says, was in charge of the CBF when the world became globalised. 'He was in a position from where he could have preserved Brazilian football. But he didn't look after it. He used it to look after himself. The Nike contract was just the most visible sign of what was going on.'

  As our meal progresses, Aldo tells me he is glad the investigation is over. He was exhausted by it. I ask him if he thinks that it will change the way football is run. He does not seem very hopeful. 'There will never be democracy in football. The best we can hope for is that the state will be able to oversee how it is run.' The CBF is a private organisation, so it can do what it likes, despite it being responsible for something as public as the national football team. Aldo hopes for a change in the law to force the CBF to be more transparent. 'Apart from the top three people [at the CBF] no one has the faintest idea of what is going on.'

  He adds again that the main problem isn't corruption. 'There's probably more corruption in Italy,' he says. 'The problem here is disorganisation and the lack of a coherent direction to deal with the money coming in. Brazil might not be in the first world in many things. But in football it is. We have the clubs, the style, the resources. So why are we losing all our stars to Europe? It doesn't make sense.' Despite his attempts to be upbeat, I sense that Aldo is frustrated and sad.

  After the Copa America defeat against Honduras, Brazil continue to stumble. In World Cup qualifiers they lose 2-1 to Argentina in Buenos Aires and 3-1 to Bolivia in La Paz. Brazil only guarantee qualification after their last match, a 3-0 victory against Venezuela, thus maintaining – just – their record as the only country to have attended every World Cup.

  There is much soul-searching about the national team's unconvincing performances. Some say Brazilians are deficient tactically because of their lack of education. Others that the joy of playing for their country has been overly diluted because of the large number of games the team plays. The Folha de São Paulo counts the FIFA-recognised matches that the world's main football nations have played between the 1994 World Cup and the end of the 2002 qualifiers. Brazil are way ahead – 138, compared to 99 for Argentina, 96 for France and 81 for England.

  A prevalent view is that Brazil play a negative game. Brazil, argues the former player Tostao, is now the country whose players commit the most fouls. In one top-level match in 2000 there were more than a hundred. (The English Premiership has an average of about thirty). Tostao says this is an indication that Brazil has been left behind while the rest of the world has progressed in tactics and training methods, and also in players' emotional preparation. Fernando Calazans, another columnist, goes further. He writes that there are so many fouls because there is no leadership within Brazilian football. The chaos and violence in the boardroom is reflected on the pitch.

  If there is a unanimous opinion it is that the sporting crisis is really a political crisis. And that any solution must include a complete clear-out of the cartolas. The amateuristic rules that govern clubs must be modernised. There must be decent domestic leagues. The CBF needs a new, professional leadership. How will this happen? The best – maybe the only – chance is the CPIs.

  Aldo Rebelo's CPI was made up of twenty-five federal deputies. They included Eurico Miranda, the president of Vasco
. He saw no conflict of interest in being both investigator and investigated. In fact, Eurico was not the only football-linked Congressman on the CPI. So was José Mendonca, the president of Santa Cruz, Luicano Bivar, the president of Sport, Max Rosemann, a director of Paraná Clube, Nelo Rodolfo, a director of Palmeiras, Darcisio Perondi, brother of the president of the Rio Grande do Sul Football Federation, Olimpio Pires, a former president of Itabira and José Rocha, a former president of Vitória. These men – known as the 'football faction' – worked collectively to hinder Aldo Rebelo's inquiry. And they succeeded.

  It is a formality that on the last day of a CPI its members vote to approve the commission's final report. Aldo realised that the football faction had managed to persuade enough 'neutral' deputies to vote against it. So he closed the session – reasoning that it was better for there to be no vote than to lose. (It's a common political shenanigan.) When he did this, the football faction shouted across the chamber: 'Stalinist coup!' Eurico stood up, called his sympathisers to his side and guffawed: 'They're using guerilla tactics – I've known what the left is like for a long time!' Eurico then presented his own 'alternative' report, which cleared the CBF. (Eurico and Darcisio Perondi, it should be noted, both received campaign donations from the CBF. They have no interest in the situation changing.)

  In the last days of Aldo's CPI, Ricardo Teixeira was in Brasilia, staying at the CBF's 'offical residence' – a house with rustic decor in the wealthiest neighbourhood, nicknamed the 'football embassy' and legendary for courting politicans over kickabouts. The CBF was frantically lobbying congressmen to vote against the report. Teixeira had even given a press conference in Brasilia with the Brazil coach, Luiz Felipe Scolari, hoping to deflect attention from the allegations against him.