What can happen this week with the RFEF? Every day, a new adventure, without it being easy to anticipate the chapters that are to come. Common sense dictates that one of these days the federal electoral commission will admit and reject the appeal of Miguel Galan against the census, validating the process that ended with Pedro Rocha as the sole candidate for the presidency. Having also dismissed the appeal against his proclamation, it is also foreseeable that the same electoral commission will proceed to proclaim the Extremaduran as president in the coming days. Although the opposite could happen, this is the RFEF.
But, in parallel, the Higher Sports Council is preparing the call of its board of directors to suspend both Rocha and the members of his management company for the alleged commission of very serious violations, which is studying the TAD, something that a priori would not happen until at least Wednesday. And from there? Well, it remains to be seen, with the latent threat that the RFEF will be intervened by FIFAwith the support of the Government.
Rocha, who plans to feel immune to all the obstacles he is encountering to be enthroned as president of the RFEF, accumulates too many errors since he took over from the first suspended and then resigned Luis Rubiales. He resists in silence while his work team proclaims his most absolute innocence (judicial, administrative and ethical) and his legitimacy to be the new president of the RFEF. But he has committed (at least) seven capital errors that call into question a satisfactory outcome for his interests.
1. Do not call imminent elections
The original sin, of those muds, these muds. On September 10, 2023, Rubiales surrenders and presents his resignation. Five days later, the RFEF announces that “Pedro Rocha will lead the transition process in the RFEF” and is already talking about him as president of the management company. The federative statutes state that, upon the dismissal of a president, “the board of directors will be constituted as a management committee and will call elections to fill the position; whoever is elected will occupy the position for a period equal to the time remaining to be fulfilled by the person replaced.”
It is true that the statutes do not temporally delimit the call, but it is clear in the wording that it is its fundamental function. After trying to call general elections to the assembly (something that the statutes do not allow, as the TAD ended up dictating), Rocha took more than six months to call themmaking decisions along the way in which, presumably, he overstepped his bounds.
Pedro Rocha, Luis Rubiales and Andreu Camps. / RFEF
2. Pay (too much) attention to Víctor Francos
Coupled with the above, The Government did not help at all to ensure that Rocha was faithful to his mission. The former president of the CSD Víctor Francos, after failing in his publicized attempt to suspend Rubiales, felt powerful after successfully solving, on September 20, 10 days after Rubiales’ resignation, the crisis of the world champions who did not want play with the national team.
Francos de facto intervened the RFEF. He convinced, or forced, depending on who you ask, Rocha to postpone the elections until 2024 and for them to be general instead of partial (the TAD decreed some time later that this could not be done), in addition to commit to cutting off heads in the Federation. The dismissal of the general secretary, Andreu Camps, without discussing the substance, is surely the clearest excess of those that the TAD is investigating.
The most recent statement from the manager pointed to the Government’s responsibility in many of the acts carried out and now reported. Francos is no longer there, they forced him to resign at the end of December, but the damage had already been done. Jose Manuel Rodriguez Uribes He is now trying to fix the mess he encountered when taking over at the CSD. And, although he does not want it, the inheritance also involves the Government becoming co-responsible for Franco’s decisions.
Pedro Rocha and Victor Francos. / EP
3. Get Rubiales’ salary
On December 21, the RFEF held its annual ordinary meeting, chaired by Rocha as the highest authority of the management commission. In said conclave, Rocha proposed to the assembly members to inherit the salary of 675,671 euros per year that Rubiales received as president of the RFEF. And he did it, as ‘El Mundo’ revealed, against the criteria of his own legal services, which considered this assignment contrary to the statutes, which only specify that the assembly is sovereign to approve the president’s salary. And Rocha was not (nor is he, for the moment at least), president of the RFEF, only of its management commission..
“Since 2013 I have been in the Extremadura Federation [era su presidente hasta hace un mes] I have never received a cent“Rocha argued before the judge in the Super Cup case in his statement as a witness (before being investigated) and, unless some judicial instance can prove otherwise, he is right. But the Extremaduran leader is tainted for attributing, in his capacity, as interim leader, a salary that, according to the statutes, should not correspond to him or it is at least very doubtful that he would.
4. Consenting or not knowing too many things
Luis Rubiales allegedly deployed a network with his partners to collect bribes from the RFEF while Rocha was his economic vice president and he says he didn’t find out anything. That same plot obtained a tender (although it was not paid) when he was already president of the management company and he did not find out either. The investigated contract with Saudi Arabia for the Super Cup was extended, through approval by a board of directors of which he was a part and he did not find out either. Tomás González Cueto pressured the Government to design presidential elections tailored to him and, although no one has asked him, he surely claims that he never found out.
If he lies and actually found out about all this, it would, indeed, be very serious. And it would have criminal consequences in some cases. Let’s take it for granted (which is a lot to give) that he didn’t find out anything. Is Rocha morally legitimate to preside over an institution in which all these things happened, while he was first economic vice president and then president of the management company without him knowing anything? It is not daring to think that Rocha is ‘guilty in vigilando’ for at least some of the events described.
5. Suspend those investigated in the Super Cup case
One day after the search in Las Rozas and other places in Spain, such as the home of Luis Rubiales, Rocha announced the cancellation of the contract with GC Legal, González Cueto’s office, and removed the two federation directors under investigation from their positions and duties. by the judge, José Javier Jiménez and Pedro González Segura.
The substance of the decision is hardly debatable: it was something that, if it could be done, should be done. Regarding the form, whether it had the power to do so or not, the TAD will have to rule. What is not supported anywhere, from an ethical point of view, is that Rocha suspended two people investigated in the Super Cup case and Now that he is also investigated by the judge, he feels perfectly legitimate to assume the presidency of the RFEF.. Although legally there is no obstacle in that sense. Rodríguez Uribes already said it on Friday, in statements to Efe: “It is unthinkable that the representative of Spanish football in the Euro Cup or the Olympic Games could be a person investigated in a criminal case. We as a country cannot allow this to happen.“.
6. Not taking your statement before the judge seriously
Rocha went to testify before the judge of Majadahonda, 10 days ago, as a witness. Smiling, self-confident and without the legal help of a lawyer. A while later, he left the court as an investigator. Without him yet knowing, everything is said, what exactly he is accused of.
His surreal statement, claiming to be unaware of facts of which he should have been aware, as they were debated and approved in his presence in the federative bodies, motivated his transition from witness to investigator. He also left pearls such as that he believed that Rubiales appointed him as his successor because he was “an honest man” and that His academic qualification was “life”.
7. Not putting together a plan B for your election
In the midst of collecting endorsements, perfectly orchestrated by all the territorial presidents in favor of Rocha, an idea was put on the table. As ‘Relevo’ revealed, He considered allocating 21 of his more than 100 endorsements to a second candidate, for what could happen in these weeks. If that had happened, today the RFEF would have a dignified and simple way out of the mess it is in.
The idea, however, was eventually scrapped. Not least because Rocha was convinced by his advisors that nothing could threaten his election as president. Neither the cataract of Galán’s complaints before the TAD nor the judicial investigation of the Super Cup case. He thought he was untouchable and now reality has shown him that he was not.
2024-04-22 05:46:58
#deadly #sins #Pedro #Rocha
