Football: Man charged over AFC document theft

KUALA LUMPUR: A Malaysian man was charged with stealing documents from the Asian Football Confederation’s (AFC) headquarters in Kuala Lumpur. Kong Lee Toong pleaded not guilty to the charge in a court, Kee Wei Lon, deputy public prosecutor in the Malaysian attorney-general’s office, told AFP. The charge comes amid an increasingly bitter battle between the governing body of Asian football and its suspended president Mohamed bin Hammam, who is being investigated for corrupt activities. The AFC had lodged a complaint with police over missing documents reportedly relating to a large payment made to bin Hammam in 2008. Hammam had complained that documents detailing ‘personal payments’ were stolen from his office, and were included in an internal AFC audit of his activities as president, carried out by PWC.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 20^th, 2012.