Photo: AFP

 

New Zealand's Serious Fraud Office said Monday it is investigating former Oceania Football Confederation employees - including ex-president David Chung - after a complaint from FIFA.

Authorities will probe whether any criminal activity had taken place, but declined to provide further details of an active investigation.

"An investigation relating to former employees of Oceania Football Confederation is ongoing," a fraud office spokesman told AFP. "The SFO commenced the investigation after receiving a complaint from the Federation Internationale de Football Association (FIFA)."

FIFA suspended Chung for six years in March 2019 for corruption related to an NZ$15 million ($10 million) building project in Auckland.

It found Chung guilty of receiving gifts and conflicts of interest over the scheme - which intended to create a lavish "Home of Football" for the confederation in the New Zealand city.

Chung, from Papua New Guinea, had been one of FIFA's most powerful officials, holding the position of senior vice-president and sitting on the organisation's ruling council.

He quietly resigned from the confederation soon after FIFA began investigating him, with the world governing body saying his departure was "for personal reasons."

The Serious Fraud Office, which has the power to investigate corrupt conduct carried out in New Zealand even if the participants are foreign nationals, did not name other ex-OFC staff under investigation.

FIFA banned former confederation general secretary Tai Nicholas for eight years in mid-2019, after it found the Cook Islander guilty of misappropriating funds and bribery in relation to the building project.

Oceania - consisting mainly of Pacific island nations - is the smallest and weakest of FIFA's six confederations, with a history of governance problems stretching back decades. During a rare visit to the region last year, FIFA president Gianni Infantino warned the confederation was on its "last opportunity" to stamp out corruption.