This is a stern warning that the French Anti-Corruption Agency (AFA) sent to the French Football Federation (FFF), at the end of an audit that lasted from June 2022 to July 2023. The body, which has administrative powers that allow to verify the reality and effectiveness of the mechanisms implemented to combat violations of probity, issued a report in January. This confidential document of about one hundred pages, revealed by Marianne and of which the world has taken note, lists thirteen recommendations that will be applied between now and the end of 2024.
The FFF began measures in 2019 “with the creation of a map of the risks of violation of probity”while it acquired, three years later, “a common code of conduct with the Professional Football League and an internal alert system”points out the AFA. However, it has very few formalized procedures and its control system is “lagoon”. For example, the federation, to which a public service mission has been delegated, must “strengthen the prevention of conflicts of interest in the purchasing process” AND “carry out the systematic public bidding provided for by the internal procedure ».
Among the shortcomings observed, the AFA points out that, “despite the existence of a purchasing procedure from 2022”, especially for amounts greater than 100,000 euros, “Actually (…) Many contracts that exceed this threshold are concluded in the over-the-counter market without public bidding.” In February and March 2023, this procedure was not respected. But if these “gaps” were announced and validated by the FFF finance committee, the latter did not justify “this tolerance”.
Furthermore, the anti-corruption agency could not “appreciate the precise role of the FFF executive committee”in March 2023, in the renewal of several associations. She “takes note of the insufficient control of the risks of violations of probity in the framework of the federation’s commercial relations with its partners, including those selected after consultation.”
It also highlights “situations of conflict of interest “in particular, as noted Mariannethe links “strong” between former president Noël Le Graët, who resigned in February 2023, and a Breton company, service provider of the FFF and member of the board of directors of the En Avant de Guingamp club, chaired until 2011 by Mr. Le Graët (whose agri-food group is part of the club’s board of directors), and then by his son-in-law for nine years.
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