After waiting almost four hours, due to a precautionary measure that prevented the vote from taking place, the Deliberative Council of the Cruzeiro unanimously approved the purchase of the club by the former soccer player Ronaldo Nazario.
Before the vote, a court in the state of Minas Gerais (southeast) accepted the request of 3 members of the Board of Directors who requested the suspension due to lack of guarantees, according to them, when Ronaldo modified the original contract and due to pressure of the fans.
Since Sunday, the Cruzeiro fans had been mobilizing in favor of the purchase of the team by the business group led by Ronaldo and dozens of supporters gathered with posters outside the club’s headquarters, where the meeting was held.
However, a judicial notification prevented the voting from taking place at the scheduled time and Ronaldo and the directors had to wait for another judge to analyze the extraordinary appeal request, which took almost 4 hours to be issued.
After the second notification, which endorsed the vote, the 215 directors who remained in place voted in less than 3 minutes in favor of the conditions imposed by Ronaldo and which were questioned by the 3 directors, despite them being favorable for sale.
“It is an honor and also a great challenge for me to take Cruzeiro back to the place where it should never have left. Today there is no reason to celebrate and no time to lose, we must roll up our sleeves and work tirelessly to return to the elite of the football,” Ronaldo declared.
The former Real Madrid and FC Barcelona striker waited patiently in the venue for the judicial decision so that the vote could be carried out.
The ‘Phenomenon’ will assume the tax debt
The current point of friction has its origin in a tax debt -initially unforeseen- of 200 million reais (about 40 million dollars), which is added to other large obligations contracted by the Belo Horizonte complex in recent years.
Ronaldo, owner of Real Valladolid in Spain, is willing to take on Cruzeiro’s tax debt, but in return he wanted the club to give him ownership of the team’s training centers (Toca I and Toca II).
The agreement between Ronaldo and Cruzeiro, the club with which he made his debut at the age of 17 and one of the great clubs in Brazil that today, however, drags on in the Second Division, It was announced on December 18 and the maximum term for the business to be definitively closed expires on April 18.
The three directors who tried to prevent the vote on Monday expressed themselves in favor of the purchase by Ronaldo, but asked that the original clauses of the contract be respected.
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