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Acting president of CONCACAF, Lisle Austin, remained firm in his view that Chuck Blazer has been fired by the federation from his position of General Secretary. This despite a statement on the official CONCACAF website which said Austin had no authority to dismiss Blazer. Blazer was dismissed after making allegations of bribery against suspended CONCACAF president Jack Warner.

Austin, a Senior Vice President, has since been elevated to head the zone, and on Tuesday, Blazer was fired. The website, however, described Austin’s action as taken without authority and said under the CONCACAF statutes, jurisdiction over the general secretary rested solely with the organisation’s executive committee. “Further, a majority of the executive committee members have advised Austin that he does not have the authority to take such action,” according to the statement on the website.

“Chuck Blazer continues as CONCACAF General Secretary and with the full authority of his office. “The Confederation continues its normal operations, including the Gold Cup commencing on June 5 at Cowboys Stadium in Dallas.” Austin, however, fired back at the statement, claiming his decision to terminate Blazer was taken after receiving legal advice. Austin questioned the legality of a meeting of four members of the CONCACAF executive committee which issued the statement. He advised that the quartet which comprised Honduras’ Alfredo Hawit, Panama’s Ariel Alvarado, Mexico’s Justino Campean and American Sunil Gulati had no authority to convene a meeting. “The presence of four executive committee members in the hotel room of Blazer does not constitute an executive committee meeting,” Austin said.

He quoted Article 29 of the CONCACAF statutes which states: “The president shall preside over the meetings of the congress, of the executive committee, of the emergency committee and of the committees,” and described the meeting as a blatant disregard for process and procedure.

Austin said the statement on the website was not only the fruit of illegal actions on the part of Blazer, but tantamount to trespassing since the unauthorised use of CONCACAF’s services and equipment by non-staff is unlawful. “In my capacity as acting president, I will not order the immediate shutdown of all on-line facilities of the confederation due to the integral role it plays in our day to day operations,” he said. He said it was sad that Blazer was using the on-line publications of a confederation of which he was no longer employed to wage a war against the office of the acting president. He said on the advice of its emergency committee, he had retained a Miami-based firm to launch a forensic audit into its accounts for the past six years.

Austin had pointed to four reasons for the dismissal of Blazer:

• that Blazer “insulted and defamed” the Caribbean nations of CONCACAF;
• that he continues to employ the American law firm aiding his investigations;
• that he failed to invite Austin to the CONCACAF caucus before Wednesday’s FIFA congress;
• and that he appointed unelected CONCACAF members as delegates to the FIFA Congress, instead of eligible members, including Austin.