Will the French Tennis Federation (FFT) be able to escape a great unpacking and a political crisis in the middle of the Roland-Garros tournament (from May 28 to June 11)? The question arises, while two leaders of the body have, according to our information, seized the ethics committee of the FFT, Wednesday, May 10, in order to denounce the “unlawful behavior” of the secretary general of the Federation, Pierre Doumayrou.
In the background of this referral: the complaint lodged against X, in March, with the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) by these same two leaders, Alain Moreau (current president of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine league), Pascal Da Costa (member of the Superior Council of Tennis), and five other elected or ex-elected for “embezzlement” and “corruption” within the FFT.
The complainants accuse the president of the FFT, Gilles Moretton, elected on February 13, 2021, and two of his relatives, Hughes Cavallin, his former chief of staff, and Jean-Luc Barrière, general treasurer of the FFT, of having “organized the diversion of Roland-Garros tournament tickets to the detriment of the FFT”and to be “exonerated from the consequences of their misdeeds” since their accession to the highest authorities of the Federation, “by means of new abuses of their functions”. This complaint is currently being analyzed by the PNF. In addition, Anticor, an anti-corruption association approved by Matignon for the exercise of the rights of the civil party, filed a report with the PNF on March 24.
“Serious violations of the statutes”
Both Anticor and the plaintiffs identified alleged misappropriation of public property in 2019, by the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes league, chaired from 2018 to 2021 by Mr. Moretton. In question: the sale, within the framework of a partnership, of eighty places to the interim company Adéquat, which then had them marketed as “VIP Gold” tickets.
The Paris committee, led by Mr. Barrière, is accused “to have sold forty tickets for a total amount of 5,370 euros during the 2019 edition of the Roland-Garros tournament to AS Events, a company specializing in the organization of events”including the companion of Mr. Cavallin “holds 50% of the shares”.
Anticor recalled that the former president of the FFT (2017-2021), Bernard Giudicelli, had seized the federal disputes commission in November 2020, alerting him to “Illicit sales of numerous Roland-Garros 2019 tickets, within the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes League, characterizing serious violations of the statutes and [des] by-laws of the Federation »as well as on the cases of Mr. Barrière, Mr. Cavallin and his companion, to the Paris committee.
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