Senior FIFA Vice-President Villar resigns amid another corruption case
The corruption crisis in world football has removed another top FIFA official.
Jailed in Spain on suspicion of financial wrongdoing as head of the Spanish football federation, Angel Maria Villar has resigned his top positions at FIFA and European governing body UEFA.
FIFA confirmed yesterday that Villar resigned as its senior vice president. That followed UEFA’s announcement he had left its executive committee after 25 years. He was suspended as Spanish federation president on Tuesday amid a criminal investigation into allegations of corruption.
Villar exits international football in disgrace after rising to the No. 2 elected position at FIFA, the most senior of eight vice presidents behind president Gianni Infantino.
Despite Infantino’s claim last year of the crisis ending for scandal-scarred FIFA, two colleagues on the ruling Council have resigned within three months under a cloud of suspicion.
“FIFA is back on track. So I can officially inform you here, the crisis is over,” Infantino told FIFA member federations in May 2016 in Mexico City at his first congress since replacing Sepp Blatter.
However, Villar follows Sheikh Ahmad al-Fahad alSabah, who resigned in April. The Kuwait royal left FIFA three days after he was identified in a federal court case in Brooklyn as the source of bribes paid to Asian football officials. He denies wrongdoing.
Villar left the week after he was arrested in his native Spain, one of four football officials detained on charges of improper management, misappropriation of funds, corruption and falsifying documents.
He was arrested in Madrid along with his son Gorka Villar, also a lawyer and former director general of South American football body CONMEBOL, and two other senior Spanish federation officials.
Spain’s government suspended the 67-year-old Angel Maria Villar from the national federation presidency for one year on Tuesday. An interim replacement was appointed Wednesday.
In a statement yesterday, UEFA said Villar had offered his resignation a day earlier “as vice president of UEFA and member of the UEFA Executive Committee with immediate effect.”
Villar was elected to the executive panel in 1992, and was UEFA’s top official for nearly a year in 2015-16 while then-president Michael Platini was suspended from duty by FIFA. Like France great Platini, Villar played for his country, then rose in football politics and fell due to allegations of financial wrongdoing.
UEFA said member federations can elect an executive committee replacement for Villar at its next 2018 congress, to be held Feb. 28 in Bratislava, Slovakia. At that same meeting, European officials can also elect a new FIFA vice president. All candidates must pass an integrity check.
Villar’s interim replacement as head of the Spanish football federation, treasurer Juan Luis Larrea, stood by his longtime boss yesterday after answering a judge’s questions at a Madrid court. Larrea said he saw no reason for Villar to also quit as president of the Spanish federation.
“I believe he considers himself innocent and he believes he doesn’t have to resign,” Larrea told Spanish national television.