Vietnam serious about tackling corruption
KUALA LUMPUR - Vietnam has been cracking down on match fixing to prevent a "corruption storm" from ruining its most popular sport, the country's soccer chief said on Monday.
Nguyen Trong Hy, president of the Vietnam Football Federation, said Vietnamese soccer had become more transparent thanks to a drive to tackle rampant graft in the domestic game, which had led to the arrest of dozens of players and referees.
"The football stake holders agreed that our efforts have produced satisfactory results, and (Vietnamese) football is widely recognised as being more and more transparent," Hy was quoted as saying on the Asian Football Confederation Web site .
"We understand that constant effort is needed and we do hope to enjoy the understanding and assistance of the AFC."
Hy said players' arrests had been damaging for the game, as teams had been weakened and supporters were becoming disillusioned by what the state-controlled soccer federation called "negative practices".
He said Vietnam would introduce a series of measures to deal with the problem, such as monitoring important matches, rule changes, stiffer penalties for offenders and a mandatory phone registration for all players and officials.
Vietnamese police used mobile phone records to trace calls to illegal bookmakers by several national team players, who are on trial for fixing the score of a Southeast Asian Games match last year.
Seven players are charged with accepting 500 million dong ($31,000) to ensure Vietnam beat Myanmar by a single goal.
In a recent interview with Reuters, national team coach Alfred Riedl said his squad had been seriously weakened by the arrests, but hoped jail terms would deter players from accepting cash to throw games.
Vietnam will co-host the 2007 Asian Cup with Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia from July 7-29.
Reuters - October 30, 2006.
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