Last night’s dismissal of the Football Association of Malaysia’s (FAM) appeal to Fifa’s Appeals Committee was not earth-shattering news.
It was not a David vs Goliath epic. It was a low-key bout; stupidity vs common sense, prompting a not-much-deliberated, inconspicuous decision.
Could one person be born at two different places 20,000km apart? Could two birth certificates be issued for the same birth - in Spanish in Santa Fe, Argentina, and in Malay in Johor Bahru, Malaysia?
Yet, they were - one was original, based on historical documents dating about 100 years ago, while the other was “created” more recently, this year.
No. These are not recreations of scenes from Grimm’s Fairy Tales, where Alice in Wonderland, Cinderella, Robin Hood, et al, who fought evil against all odds to come out looking good.
Anything coming close would be the Pied Piper who carried away the loot, aptly summing up the role of the intermediary who collected his agents’ fees and rode away into the sunset.
To put it bluntly, it was a made-up burlesque vs the real thing.
Slap in the face
Who conjured such an act, ala David Copperfield, and thought that they could get away with it with a sleight of hand, or documents? Who provided the props and support that emboldened the mission to cheat the world?
The answers may come, perhaps in six weeks, when former chief justice Raus Sharif and members of his independent investigation committee, which is probing the documentation issue involving seven heritage players, present their findings.
The decision of Fifa’s Appeals Committee, however, was predictable - a reaffirmation of a damning verdict from Fifa’s Disciplinary Committee - consigning the nation’s football administrators to the bottom of the heap and concluding that “Malaysia used forged documents.”
Would anyone trust us again?
The global governing body’s core finding still stands, unexpunged and echoing in the football pitches of international sports and hallowed halls of governments: “Using fraudulent documentation to allow a player to compete constitutes, pure and simple, a form of cheating, which cannot in any way be condoned.”
This was more than a ruling; the fact stated subjected Malaysian football and its systems of governance to global odium, ridicule, and contempt.
Shameful doubling down
Labelled as cheats, how did FAM initially respond?
By hiring expensive foreign legal counsel to orchestrate a retreat into denial, attempting to wash away the scandal with the feeble excuse of a “technical error”.
This insinuates the existence of a “dirty tricks” unit within FAM - one that allegedly procured and submitted fabricated documentation, including the birth certificates of the players’ grandparents.
When Fifa announced the “guilty verdict” on Sept 27, FAM claimed the finding that players had “obtained or were aware of forged documents” was unfounded, citing a lack of evidence.
They announced an appeal against the sanctions: a CHF350,000 (RM1.8 million) fine for FAM and one-year suspensions for the seven players involved.
The players are Spanish-born Gabriel Felipe Arrocha, Facundo Tomas Garces, and Jon Irazabal Iraurgui; Argentinian-born Rodrigo Julian Holgado and Imanol Javier Machuca; Netherlands-born Hector Alejandro Hevel Serrano; and Brazilian-born Joao Vitor Brandao Figueiredo.
Their credibility, too, has suffered for being involved in one of the biggest sports scandals in the country. No work, no salaries for a year.
After the debacle, who will employ them? Will they be able to play again?
Fifa said investigators had the evidence before them - original birth certificates of the grandparents, which showed they were born in the Netherlands, Argentina, and Spain - all corresponding with the players’ birthplaces, not in Johor Bahru, Penang, or Malacca as claimed by FAM.
What was FAM’s official line? “All players are legitimate Malaysian citizens, and the issue was a simple administrative mistake - a staff member wrongly uploaded documents from a player agent instead of official copies from the National Registration Department (NRD).”
As this version quickly unravelled, FAM switched tack. Its defence (on the advice of its legal counsel) was simple: blame elsewhere.
The organisation claimed it had nothing to do with the falsification or forgery. Yet, a witness statement from NRD director Badrul Hisham Alias spilt the beans.
The NRD admitted it was unable to trace the original birth certificates and issued new ones based on unspecified “secondary evidence.”
This raised a critical question: What was this secondary evidence, and why was it deemed sufficient for citizenship but not for Fifa’s stringent eligibility checks?
Shifting blame
Herein lies FAM’s fundamental failure. It is FAM’s onerous duty - no one else’s - to ensure a player’s eligibility under Fifa statutes.
Fifa is not questioning the NRD’s power to grant citizenship; it is questioning whether FAM followed the rules to prove that these players were eligible to play for Malaysia.
FAM failed, catastrophically.
Then, in a stunning abdication of responsibility, FAM shifted the blame to the government during a media conference. Their Geneva-based lawyer, Serge Vittoz, insisted, “FAM was not a party” to the forgery.
If not FAM, then who? The NRD? The government? The silence from Vittoz and other FAM officials in response to this question was deafening.
Their strategy was clear: admit the documents were forged, but deny any involvement - a legalistic charade that has now collapsed.
The dismissal of FAM’s appeal means the sanctions and the shame remain. Both the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and the Youth and Sports Ministry have been waiting for this outcome.
Now, the question is: will FAM play its final, desperate card - a costly appeal to the International Court of Arbitration for Sport?
Such a move would be an exercise in futility, attempting to conjure a different outcome with the same discredited facts. Who would bear the cost of this vanity project?
The Malaysian public. A RM30 million government-funded war chest, intended for the “win at all costs” pursuit of football glory, is being squandered on legal fees to defend the indefensible.
It is time to stop the charade. The money would be better spent on rebuilding our footballing integrity from the grassroots up.
Continuing this fight does not protect our players or our nation’s honour - it only deepens our disgrace. - Mkini
R NADESWARAN is a veteran journalist who tries to live up to the ethos of civil rights leader John Lewis: “When you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have to speak up. You have to say something; you have to do something.” Comments: citizen.nades22@gmail.com
The views expressed here are those of the author/contributor and do not necessarily represent the views of MMKtT.
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