FRANKFURT (GERMANIA), 22 May. (DPA/EP) –
The Frankfurt Higher Regional Court has reopened the proceedings against former directors of the German Football Federation (DFB) Theo Zwanziger, Wolfgang Niersbach and Horst R. Schmidt for alleged tax fraud in connection with the awarding of the 2006 World Cup to Germany.
“The prosecution accuses the three of tax evasion or complicity in the evasion of corporate tax, the solidarity surcharge (surcharge for the reconstruction of East Germany), the business tax and the sales tax for the year 2006” , reads the statement from the court with which they announced the reopening of the case this Monday.
The court annulled last October’s decision by the Frankfurt district court, which decided last year to close the investigation after the dismissal of a trial against the three former DFB executives and FIFA secretary general Urs Linsi, in Switzerland.
The case focuses on a payment of 6.7 million euros that the DFB paid through FIFA to the late businessman Robert Louis-Dreyfus, declared as part of the organization of a World Cup gala that never took place, who later He sent it to Franz Beckenbauer and he sent it to an account belonging to Mohammed bin Hammam, a former FIFA vice president later banned for life for corruption.
In the previous trial in Switzerland, the defendants were acquitted of having misled the members of the then World Cup Organizing Committee about the true reason for the payment of 6.7 million euros, but in this new case the reason is different. . In the present proceedings, the defendants are accused of having unreasonably included the payment as an operating expense in the DFB’s profit calculation.
The former president of the DFB Zwanziger did not declare his concern because, according to him, “there was no tax evasion”, which is the only thing that is evaluated in the trial. “For almost four years, accusations have gone back and forth from one court to another to the detriment of those involved. It is unbelievable,” he declared.