Immersed in an economic crisis, Barcelona presents this Tuesday the results of a report that has led the club to file a complaint with the prosecutor’s office, which is investigating whether irregularities may have occurred in the management of the previous directive.
This so-called ‘forensic’ report was a consequence of the audit released last October by the club’s general director, Ferran Reverter, who assured that in March 2021, upon the arrival of the new management there was a “situation of accounting bankruptcy” .
This audit then found a debt and future commitments worth 1,350 million euros (1,557 million dollars), cash problems and a triggered salary mass.
The audit covered the management of the club by the board chaired by Josep Maria Bartomeu from the 2018/2019 season until the arrival of Joan Laporta’s board in March 2021.
“There were indications for which we had to go further, and for this reason we have done a ‘forensic'”, Reverter said then.
“Basically to look for evidence of possible indications and in case of finding any irregularity, the club would pass it on to the legal department to take the appropriate measures in order to purge responsibilities,” he added.
The ‘forensic’ focused mainly on payments to intermediaries and suppliers, as well as on issues related to the Espai Barça project (the remodeling of the Camp Nou stadium and its surroundings).
Commissions too high
Reverter already pointed in October to exaggerated commissions to intermediaries, the division of operations in several contracts to avoid controls or the “crazy” purchase of players.
“We have the feeling that when we signed players, it was not planned if they could be paid. The same night they sign Griezmann they realize that there is no money to sign him and they had to ask for money from a fund,” Reverter stressed.
Four months after that presentation and with the conclusions of the new report, Barça filed a complaint last week with the Barcelona Prosecutor’s Office, which has opened an investigation to find out if any crime could have occurred.
Bartomeu, who presided over the club from 2014 until his resignation in October 2020, defended his work, rejecting the figures of the new board and blamed the losses on the crisis caused by Covid-19.
The Barça club closed the 2020/2021 financial year with losses of 481 million euros (565.4 million dollars), while for the current season it trusts to be able to close with a small profit of 5 million euros (5.8 million dollars). of dollars).
‘Barçagate’
“Our management was very serious and responsible,” the former Barça president said in an interview with the Mundo Deportivo newspaper in October.
Bartomeu was forced to resign in October 2020 to avoid a motion of censure, after the end of his term marred by conflicts with the squad, the decline in sport and legal problems, mainly due to the so-called ‘Barçagate’.
The former Barça president appeared last March before a judge, who released him on provisional release for this case, in which possible “crimes of unfair administration and corruption in business” are being investigated.
The ‘Barçagate’, uncovered in 2020 by Cadena Ser radio, consisted of hiring the company I3 Ventures to allegedly carry out a smear campaign on social networks against opponents of Bartomeu and figures such as Lionel Messi, Gerard Piqué or the current coach Xavi Hernandez.
According to the broadcaster, Barça paid one million euros (1.2 million dollars), divided into smaller contracts to supposedly avoid internal controls, to the company I3 Ventures, from which it separated after the scandal.
Then, the board chaired by Bartomeu admitted the hiring of the company, but denying that it was to defame anyone but to monitor different areas of the club on social networks.
