On Monday the football federation of Cameroon announced that it will be investigating allegations of match-fixing lodged against members of its own national soccer team. It has been believed that there are seven members in the football squad who might have contributed to the team's dismal performance in this year's World Cup. Although Fecafoot has yet to be contacted by FIFA, the sport's global governing body, about the matter, it has confirmed that it has tasked its own ethics committee to open a probe, the Indian Express reported.
Fecafoot said in the statement, "Recent allegations of fraud around Cameroon's three 2014 FIFA World Cup preliminary games, especially Cameroon vs. Croatia, as well as the `existence of seven bad apples (in our national team)' do not reflect the values and principles promotes by our administration in line with the FIFA Code of Conduct and the ethics of our nation. We wish to inform the general public that, though not contacted by FIFA in regards to this affair, our administration has already instructed its ethics committee to further investigate these accusations."
Cameroon's run in the World Cup was disastrous at best, conceding nine goals and scoring just one out of its three group matches. Cameroon had lost 1-0 against Mexico, 4-0 to Croatia and 4-1 to host country Brazil, the Indian news outlet said. Moreover, the team's match against Croatia was marred by an onfield argument between teammates Benoit Assou-Ekotto and Benjamin Moukandjo, which led to the former headbutting the latter.
Apart from the match-fixing probe, Fecafoot also stated that an investigation about the behavior of its players in the Croatia match are underway.
Der Spiegel, who first reported the story about match-fixing by Cameroon players has been denied by its own whistleblower, the Guardian said. Convicted match-fixer Wilson Raj Perumal denied that he did made such claims to a Der Spiegel journalist during a Facebook conversation.
He said, "At no time did I make reference to four goals being scored or to a red card being issued. At no time did I suggest that I had any way of corroborating or substantiating what was meant to be an educated guess based on my extensive match-fixing experience. Last but not least: at no time was I informed by the Der Spiegel journalist that our chat was going to end up in the German publication."
Nonetheless, Der Spiegel remains firm with its story and issued a separate statement regarding the matter. The paper said, "We firmly stand by our assertion that Mr Perumal wrote in a Facebook chat with Der Spiegel some hours before the World Cup match Croatia v Camerooon, that the result will be a 4-0 win to Croatia and that a Cameroon player will get a red card in the first half."
