The corrupt president of the Argentine Football Association (AFA), Claudio "Chiqui" Tapia, presented his statement this Thursday investigation into the cause that investigates an alleged improper withholding of contributions of more than 19 billion pesos. In his written statement, the leader denied having committed a crime both personally and from the institution he presides over and requested to be dismissed for
the absence of a crime.“I expressly, categorically and circumstantially deny having deliberately decided, ordered, executed or consented to the lack of income from taxes or social security resources withheld by the Argentine Football Association,” Diego Amarante said in the letter submitted to economic criminal judge Diego Amarante.
In addition, he assured that he had no direct intervention in decisions related to tax matters. “It is imperative to reiterate from the outset that, beyond the institutional position I hold, I have neither personal nor legally decision-making intervention in the tax matters that constitute the object of this
cause,” he explained.
“The President's activity, at least since I was in office and in the same way it happened before, makes it materially impossible to participate in the daily internal bureaucratic operation,” he added
.The institutional defense of the AFA
On the other hand, Tapia also defended the institutional action of the AFA in relation to fiscal obligations. According to his disclaimer, the entity "not only has not acted unlawfully, but it has disclosed its affidavits in a timely manner, exhibiting all the obligations that were eventually due to be paid, without distortions or concealments”. In that regard, he added that these submissions "were not subject to any challenge”
.
"The AFA is accused of being suspected of malicious conduct with respect to obligations that it never concealed, never disguised and which it also regularized without having known
the existence of the cause,” he said.The president of the AFA also maintained that there was no consolidated tax loss, since the obligations were later paid together with the corresponding interest. “There was no consolidated material tax loss, as long as the obligations were paid and regularized with their corresponding compensatory (not punitive) interests,” he remarked.
The complaints about the public dissemination of the case
For his part, the leader also pointed out against the media dissemination of the cause and suggested that it responds to external interests. “The overwhelming public publicity that this case has had has not been exempt from early and unfounded assessments
,” he said.
"There is no doubt that it responds to interests whose motivation I can reasonably assume, although I will not have to go into more detail about it because it does not constitute a question strictly related to the accusation. However, it is not possible to ignore it in view of the very serious damage it generates,” he said
