- following discussions with President Granger, Joe Harmon, Christopher Jones

Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) President Victor Montagliani yesterday declared that stronger governance models aid in eradicating corruption while promoting transparency and accountability within the confederation.

He was speaking at a press conference held yesterday afternoon at the Le Meridien Pegasus Hotel.

Asked what measures and systems CONCACAF institutes to ensure transparency and accountability given the recent history of corruption that has tainted the confederation, Montagliani said: “One of the things we have done both at FIFA and CONCACAF, I was very honored to be a part of both reform committees, was to change our statutes and governance structure, as it relates to checks and balances, how money comes in and more importantly how money goes out.”

The United States of America (US A) Department of Justice has charged several members of the world governing body for racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering during its FIFA corruption investigation in 2016.

Among the officials charged include then CONCACAF President Jeffrey Webb, former Panamanian federation president Ariel Alvarado, Honduran official Rafael Callejas, Guatemalan federation president Brayan Jimenez, former Guatemalan federation president Rafael Salguero, Guatemalan federation secretary Hector Trujillo and exSalvadoran federation president Reynaldo Vasquez.

It was against that backdrop that Montagliani spoke of the efforts being made by both FIFA and CONCACAF in improving transparency and accountability.

“So that has changed, there is a lot more auditing that will be done. Even our one CONCACAF fund that we established this year, I know sometime it’s a bit of a pain for some of our members because it seems a little bureaucratic, the reality is that from where we were, we have no choice but to establish those criteria. The days of just handing somebody a cheque and saying all the best to you is gone,” Montagliani said.

He went on: “It’s the reality of the world we live in and it’s the right thing to do quite frankly because we can’t afford another slip up that way. We can’t afford people that are in the game that perpetrated those kind of things and as I said in the past, there is still that kind of stuff going on in