The portraits of these personalities belonging to the gratin of Belgian football adorned, until now, the sports pages of the daily newspapers. Since Friday January 14, they have migrated to the miscellaneous news section. That day, the federal prosecutor’s office, in charge of the fight against serious crime, fraud and terrorism, struck a blow: it asked for the dismissal of the 56 people – managers, players, agents, coaches and referees – before Justice. A company and some 200 other players are in the crosshairs of the tax inspection services.
Started in 2018, this “clean hands” – or “Footbelgate” – operation led to a real earthquake. It involves eleven of the eighteen clubs in the Pro League and leading leaders, former or current, of the clubs of Bruges, Anderlecht, Standard Liège, Genk, Charleroi, Ghent. The Belgian top 6, joined by more modest teams apparently also involved in a scandal of black money, false invoices, match fixing or bribes.
Irony, or symbol: the current leader of the championship, the small Brussels club of Union Saint-Gilloise, is not affected by the scandal, any more than the last three of the classification, Zulte Waregem, Seraing and Beerschot.
Judges must decide soon whether to dismiss some or all of the bigwigs who for years participated in a perverted system that the federal prosecutor’s office says was set up by a “criminal organization”. Given the appeals that will be introduced and the delaying maneuvers that some defendants will engage in, the trial, scheduled for Antwerp, will probably not take place before 2023.
Some hope at least that, by then, a new generation of leaders will improve the image of a footballing nation which, another irony, has been enthroned since 2018 in first place in the FIFA world rankings, ahead of Brazil and France. .
Dozens of interrogations over two years
None of this gigantic affair would have been known without the stubbornness of the prosecution and the revelations of a key man, players’ agent Dejan Veljkovic. This former Serbian striker from the Aalst club had become, over time, a central player in the Belgian championship.
At the head of a company based in Cyprus, endowed with an incomparable relational network and endowed with an overflowing imagination, Dejan Veljkovic set up an organization which enabled him to become a millionaire and to ensure that leaders, coaches or players can hide part of their income or benefit from secret commissions. From 30 to 40 million euros of black money would have passed through the account of the agent, who claims to have redistributed 25.
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