AFA president formally charged with tax evasion | OneFootball

The Argentine Football Association (AFA), along with its president Claudio “Chiqui” Tapia and other officials, was formally charged with tax evasion, according to a ruling released this Monday.

Tapia is accused of “misappropriation of tax revenues” and “misappropriation of social security funds.” He was ordered to have his assets frozen for a total of 350 million Argentine pesos (R$ 1.3 million).

The AFA was also charged and had its assets frozen. The judge issued the same ruling against four other officials from the organization, including Tapia’s right-hand man, Pablo Toviggino.

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The ruling stems from a criminal complaint filed by the tax collection agency ARCA, which accused the AFA and its officials of improper withholdings and failure to pay taxes and social security contributions, totaling approximately 19 billion pesos (more than R$ 70 million).

Tapia and the other four defendants appeared before the judge in the case on March 12. The AFA said the debts do not exist and blamed the issue on pressure from the government of Argentina’s president, Javier Milei.

Milei wants the country’s football clubs to stop being non-profit entities and become sports corporations, a model equivalent to Brazil’s SAFs, something that is rejected by the clubs themselves and incompatible with the AFA’s bylaws.

The AFA, chaired by Tapia since 2017, is also under investigation for possible money laundering, in a case in which the organization was the target of a search and seizure operation in December, related to its transactions with a private financial company.

*By AFP

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.