In the light of recent events, it is our prerogative (being the first organized supporters group in Europe) to tackle the source of misbehaving of Croatian fans, during the last match of the European Championship. Do not be mistaken, they are CROATIAN FANS, maybe more so than those who accuse them today. Croatian fans live their emotions and consider the national team to be sacred, but are at the same time ready to hurt their teams’ chances for progress in search of international help. Clutching your fist at your own kin is the hardest thing to do, but when all other options are depleted, it is the only way to seek justice. This raises the question of how desperate the fans must be, when they are willing to risk high fines and prison time, just to send a message?
Even though the supporters group “Torcida” was not in any way related to this emotional outburst, we couldn’t in all truth say it was not expected. For the past five years we have been warning all government and football officials, about the massive dissatisfaction and miss agreement with where our national football is heading. Our Football Federation is crippled with affairs, infested with criminals and run by marionettes and dirty money.
Zdravko Mamić , who is the current executive director of our Football federation, is at the moment pending criminal charges for misuse of position and authority, bribery and embezzling , of over 15.1 million Euros. This all happened while he was Executive Director of GNK Dinamo, a position he kept up until the court gave him a banning order to conduct any executive work, while the trial and investigation are taking place. He was charged for embezzling money in the following way: at the time of a players transfer, he would sign an annex to the professional contract in which the player would have the right to 50% of the total amount of future transfer fees, even though in reality the player did not have any claim to that money. The club would then pay that money to the player, and the player would return the money in cash to Zdravko Mamic or other members of his family. Also, his brother who is the current manager of GNK Dinamo was charged for taking over 3.1 million Euros in loans from GNK Dinamo in a two year span. Charges indicate that he had returned those loans by taking 50% of players transfer fees and returning the money to GNK Dinamo, while keeping the rest for himself. Police departments dealing with organized crime; found the testimony of Liverpool FC defender Dejan Lovren to be quite interesting. As part of the aforementioned scheme, GNK Dinamo had made a payment of 3.4 million Euros to Dejan Lovren, as a part of his fees for the transfer to Liverpool FC. According to the investigation, what actually happened was that Dejan Lovren kept only 200,000 Euros for himself, while the rest of the money he gave to Zdravko Mamic or some of his family members in cash. On a further note, Zdravko Mamic is also pending criminal charges for tax evasion of up to 1.6 mil Euros, and at the same time is charged for bribing a tax officer who did not charge any income or other local taxes to Dinamo Zagreb.
Zdravko Mamic has risen to power and accumulated capital during an after war period, a time in which crony capitalism and corruption were spread around Croatia. During those years he became friends or had funded numerous important people in Croatia. He is a close friend and an associate of Milan Bandic, the controversial major of Zagreb. He is also a close friend with the Head of County Court of Zagreb Ivan Turudić and has also funded the election campaign of the ruling political party in Croatia. The current President of Republic of Croatia, also had her presidential campaign funded by Zdravko Mamic. He even organized a private birthday party for her, which was placed in his villa, and attended by her and a number of other Croatian politicians. Whenever Zdravko Mamic gets indicted for something, he calls in a favor and ends up in the company of high-ranking Government officials like the current First Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Karamarko. Just recently, briefly after Mamic was released from custody, they have been witnessed while having a private meeting. After those meetings, somehow all his indictments tend to end up in the “back draw” of the judicial system.
Even the Director of the Special Intelligence Agency was relieved of duty, shortly after the President of Croatia found out that Zdravko Mamic was under surveillance in a pending investigation.
Although GNK Dinamo are the current Croatian football league champions, their title was celebrated by less than 500 people on the stands. While he was executive director of FC Dinamo, he first placed his brother to be the sports director and soon after the manager of the club. All of this obvious corruption and nepotism drove away all the Dinamo supporters who were not satisfied with the way this publicly owned club is governed. When the manager of the Croatian national team was not obedient to him, Zdravko Mamic fired him and installed two of his “puppets”, Davor Suker as the Football Federation president, Ante Cacic, (who was at the time coach of GNK Dinamo B team called FC Lokomotiva), while at the same time naming himself as the executive director
Currently, a total of 16 out of 23 national team player, allegedly have usurious contracts with Zdravko Mamic, which means that he gets a cut of all earnings, salaries, bonuses and transfer fees they make.
It is estimated that he gets 40.000 Euros overall from the players for every win and 20.000 Euros for every draw on EURO 2016 in France, all made as cash payments. The latest example is the world’s best midfielder Luka Modric. In the pending lawsuit against Mamic, Luka Modric testified in front of police investigators that according to the terms of his civil contract, he is obliged to make cash payments (which range from 25-30% of his total earnings) to Zdravko Mamic. Usually this is hidden from the public eye, but some players decided to resist. A good example is the former Arsenal FC striker Eduardo Da Silva. He was not willing to make cash payments to Zdravko Mamic anymore and took the whole thing to court. According to his usurious contract, he had to pay 40% of his total earnings. Due to the fact that Zdravko Mamic had through the football federation paid numerous fees for “financial consultation” to at least two County Court judges (Jasna Smiljancic and Ivica Veselic), from the very beginning it was obvious that Eduardo did not stand a chance in Croatian courts.
Zdravko Mamic still rules the Croatian Football Federation and gets to pick a coach as well as all the players. Remember Alen Halilovic, the 20 year old FC Barcelona “wunderkind”, who had a great year playing for Real Sporting de Gijon. He is not a part of the squad on EURO 2016, because he ended his relationship with Zdravko Mamic on bad terms and allegedly does not give him a cut of the earnings. Another good example is the aforementioned 26 year old Liverpool FC defender Dejan Lovren. A player who was in the starting line-up at this years’ UEFA Europa League final against FC Sevilla, was also not invited to EURO 2016 team, because he refused “to be obedient” and spoke out in public. It is clear to everybody in Croatia that players in rotation are called solely from GNK Dinamo for the purpose of raising their price on the international market. Remember Sammir who played in starting lineup against Cameroon in World Cup in Brazil 2014?He was later sold to Getafe FC and never called to the national team again. People in Croatia grow weary of these choices and feel we could play a much more important role in international football, only if the team selection was based on quality and not Zdravko Mamic’s private interests.
Croatian fans tried every democratic way to enforce some order in Croatian Football Federation. Even the Croatian parliament, which was pressured by the general public and football fans, passed a law called Sports’ Act , which was supposed to make funding and finances of all sport clubs in Croatia transparent. Croatian Football Federation and GNK Dinamo (both ruled by Zdravko Mamic) issued a statement that the government law does not apply to them and they shall not abide. Predrag Šustar, the current Minister of Sport (under whose authority this law should be enforced) does nothing, because he is a member of the Party funded by Zdravko Mamic. The president of the Republic of Croatia was also member of that same Party.
Concerning Davor Suker, the current President of our Football Federation, we are sad to say that the days of his glory are far behind him. A player, who was once seen as a national hero, now is nothing more than a criminal offender (convicted of stealing 25.000 Euros worth of Greek golden coins from an airplane) and a puppet of Mamic, who is looking for an easy living at the expense of our Football Federation.
It is sad to have the feeling that your national team is stolen from you, and that it is now in the hands of criminals who could not care less about our homeland as far as their wallets are full. This and many other reasons is why we are afraid that ignoring the symptoms created a state that is about to inflame the whole system, which will end in catharsis. Croatian Football Federation is in need of redemption to its fans, and the only solution is that all executives resign their positions and we start all over.
Help our fans kick criminals out of football and take back the national team!
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