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BrahimHemdani

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Everything posted by BrahimHemdani

  1. BrahimHemdani
    I think that BD has touched on another aspect, again one that I raised in 2011; namely that if the same offence or the same type of offence continues to ocur, then in my opinion that is prima facie evidence that whatever action the Club has taken is not effective ergo they SHOULD be charged. However the answer I got at the time was the typical each case will be dealt with on its merits. Here again it would probably take government intervention to force a change.
  2. BrahimHemdani
    I'm not sure that you are correct about vicarious liablity in respect of the criminal law; but I don't think Celtic could be charged under the OBA unless the Club actually engaged in conduct that was offensive (steady!) AND likely to provoke public disorder. I may be mistaken but I don't think that (even if you could prove that they deliberately allowed the conduct by their fans or even turned a blind eye to it) they could be charged with a criminal offence for the actions of their fans. However football rules are different and if it had happened at a UEFA controlled match they would have had no defence. But in the SPL if you made announcements, employ the prescribed number of stewards etc, it will be held that you did enough. Remember again that Hearts were not charged because a steward was not able to stop the attack on Lennon. On the contrary when they banned fans for unacceptable conduct that adds weight to their defence.
  3. BrahimHemdani
    Quite so and remember that is an INTERNAL SPL investigation carried out I think by the SPL Secretary Ian Blair the result of which was that Celtic were not even charged with any offence. So long as a Club can demonstrate: They made announcements etc prior to the incident They did what they could to deal with it at the time (which might just be advising the Police or even just observing it; I don't know the standards that are applied in practice) They made further announcements afterwards. They will not be charged with any offence under the SPL Rules as they stand. Exactly the same defence was used in 2011 http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/288082/SFA-clear-Celtic-after-chant-probe
  4. BrahimHemdani
    This is the essential contradiction. You would think that UEFA being the higher authority; the SFA/SPL would have to take the lead from them; but UEFA apparently leave it up to the member associations to make their own rules and as I said the government did not want to intervene (any more than they already had done) in 2011. I found it deeply disappointing at the time and please remember that I was representing ALL fans at the time, not Rangers supporters per se.
  5. BrahimHemdani
    I only deal in facts that I can back up. I did indeed look at the web site but didn't see the drop down that used to be there for the Board Members. I assume BD did likewise recently and couldn't find the information but no doubt he will speak for himself. I may be missing it (if so would welcome your guidance) but I don't see a SEARCH facility. Perhpas it's only open to members?
  6. BrahimHemdani
    I can't speak for the board or the auditors nor would you expect me to but in answer to your last two questions: the management letter was directed to me as Secretary in the first instance, so obviously that would be a "yes" and "no" I did not have any other contact with the firm concerned before, during or after my involvement with RST. I am sure they will be happy to confirm that if required. I hope that's helpful.
  7. BrahimHemdani
    I predicted that this would be the outcome. To the best of my knowledge and belief no Club has ever been charged with such an offence far less found guilty because they can always hide behind the "reasonably practicable" defence. Going back to Mr Lennon being attacked at Tynecastle, that was why Hearts were not charged; because they had all the stewards in place that were required by the local authority. I argued very strongly against this and in favour of the UEFA rule of "absolute responsibilty" when I was a member of the JRG; but the vested interests in the SFA & the SPL prevailed. I believe that the Police were symapthetic but not sufficiently so to push the issue. Against the wishes of the Civil Servants, I brought it up at the final meeting of the JAG; and Mr McAskill said that they would revisit it if things didn't improve in future. Perhaps now is the time.
  8. BrahimHemdani
    You did withhold the information from me, Christine, prior to the audit meeting, and I note that you offer no explanation. You agree that there was mismanagement that existed before my involvement and I also note that you offer no explanation for your failure as Treasurer to bring forward any proposals to deal with that mismanagement. I stated the facts about Alison's appointment; it is up to others to draw their own conclusions. The volte face by the auditors has always been a mystery to me. You are correct that I was prepared to sign off the accounts if the persons responsible for the mismanagement resigned and my financial management proposals (which dealt with budgets, management accounts, and specifically stated that "In order to maintain accurate and complete accounting records it is essential that all income is received and banked by the Treasurer and all invoices passed to the Treasurer for payment."; which might seem obvious to many but had not been happening hitherto) were implemented in full. The bounced cheques issue opened a can of worms, many of which were down to cash payments. Properly identifying the debt in the accounts, removing the sources of the issues and ensuring that they could not recur in future seemed to me like a reasonable basis to move on at the time and I was not alone in that view. I am sure that all current members of RST will welcome your assurance that its financial management is now much better than it was at that time. I would be delighted not to have to defend my position on this again; but I suspect that I may be disappointed. However, moving on, for the time being at least, as others including BD have asked; why do the RST no longer publish the names of the Board members or at the very least the Office Bearers? So now you have two former Secretaries asking the same question.
  9. BrahimHemdani
    I think this is a decent idea that may well be worth exploring. For what it's worth, I would suggest it is set at a level that everyone who wants and can afford to do so, would be prepared to contribute. The £50 sounds fine to me; but it might need to be even less, say £20 or £25 to encourage as many as possible to join. What about the price of a ticket for one match, which would be even less. The issue then would be that the dealing cost would render it not cost effective. So it might need to be a block purhcase but that then leads to other issues because they would have to be in one name. So on balance it has to be high enough to make it cost effective for an individual to buy and absord the dealing costs and low enough to be affordable for as many as possible and still be cost effective. So it is probably in the £50-£100 range. I would strongly suggest that it is set at one price for all or perhaps better a set number of shares regardless of price because then there is no issue about anyone who owns more shares wanting more votes etc. 250 shares might work, at today's 26.5p that would be £66.25 + costs. The number of shares could be adjusted in future years as the price rose or fell to keep it affordable.
  10. BrahimHemdani
    Nothing against either group but it would be tremendous if there were singing groups at each end of the ground who could try to outdo or respond to each other. The most intimidating atmospheres I can recall were in Belgrade vs Red Star in 2007 and also in Tel Aviv earlier that year. The Malaga fans had a great chant and response going here on Saturday night vs Sevilla. Each side of the stadium trys to outdo the other and it just builds to a crescendo.
  11. BrahimHemdani
    If you think (wrongly) that the RST auditors would allow the Secretary to write an email for them, then that does not say a great deal for the auditors. Of course, as you well know , that is not true. I did not write the auditors email and I can prove that as well. If you wish I will publish the email that I sent them and their letter in full, though the vast majority has already been published. I expressed surprise to the auditors that certain matters had not been included in the first draft of their report and they then re-drafted it in their own words and I must admit that even I was surprised at the strength of what they said. If they had thought that my concerns were misplaced then no doubt they would have responded accordingly. The reasons that I refused to sign the accounts have also been published: 1. Financial irregularities and mismanagement revealed by the audit of RST Accounts for the Year ended 5 April 2010. 2. It had become impossible for me to perform the role of Secretary due to lack of support by the Chair and others who had actively undermined my position. 3. The Chair had impugned my objectivity and integrity in the Election process. Furthermore, the auditors, not me, said that there might be an FSA investigation, something I had never even suggested; and as a registered person I could not afford to be involved; as well as the obvious fact that the accounts as proposed did not disclose the true nature of the debt or the conflict of interest that arose as a result. I did indeed call for the resignations of everyone who was implicated in the cover up (some of whom I was persauded to overlook) and as a result was subjected to a campaign of vilification. I don't recall questioning your integrity but it is a fact, is it not, that you kept this matter from me, which was obviously material to consideration of the accounts which I had to sign in my capacity as Secretary? Did you think that I wouldn't notice that there was an unidentified debt in the accounts or question the manner in which it had been created and reduced? It is also a fact, is it not, that you, Stephen Smith, Gordon Dinnie and Mr Dingwall kept this matter from me and other members of the Board? Perhaps rather than taking another pot shot at me you might care to explain why that was the case? As for Alison, I have said nothing more or less than the fact that she was proposed for the Board by Mr Dingwall shortly before I uncovered this matter. I well recall the meeting at which I asked if we shouldn't at least meet her before co-opting her on to the Board but I was over-ruled. At the very least that was bad practice; but in no way does it impugn her integrity; it says nothing about her at all. I have been silent on these matters for more than three years and I did not raise it this time; but if you expect me to sit back and allow distortions of the truth to go unchallenged on a public forum, then you are very much mistaken. If you accept that there needed to be tighter financial controls, why didn't you as Treasurer introduce them long before I came on the scene? As you said the particular matter had arisen a year before I was elected to the Board and it is my understanding that the unaccountable practice of paying expenses out of cash income, for example, had been going on for a great deal longer, had it not? Why then was it left to me as the recently appointed Secretary to propose these reforms; could that have been because I was the only one prepared to stand up to Mr Dingwall? I take it you are aware how difficult the the then Chair, Stephen Smith, made that for me?
  12. BrahimHemdani
    My answer to that is that in my opinion McCollCo etc had Paul Murray on board was nothing to do with his financial credility as an investor in Rangers, which is all I was referring to.
  13. BrahimHemdani
    I think that McColl at least (I don't know about King) thought he was the acceptable face of the "old guard" and might be a uniting influence. I haven't said anything against him personally, so I'm not sure it is fair to list me as one of his detractors. McColl had the money but didn't wish to invest. Murray apparently had some money to invest but not enough as was seen at the the time of the TBK's.
  14. BrahimHemdani
    The debt arose from two cheques issued by Follow Follow for a total of £2,690 which were not paid by FF's bank, as described in my statement. This also gives the lie to the alternative explanation put forward; because if you do not have the money to cover the cheques because other people owe you money and you do not have any other money within your business to cover those cheques; then you know that any cheques you issue will bounce, so why would you issue cheques if you knew they were going to bounce? Once you issue cheques that bounce, you are indebted to the person or business to whom you issued them i.e. RST; even if that is in terms of saving you from having an overdraft to cover the cheques (assuming you could obtain one).
  15. BrahimHemdani
    Perhaps I should clarify; I was not impugning his integrity, I meant from a financial point of view.
  16. BrahimHemdani
    I think you are being a trifle disingenuous here Christine. The auditors had a detailed list of things that had been done wrong, one of which was all the cash transactions. There may well have been other CA's involved that I was not aware of; but there was only one on the Board at that time and she had been introduced by Mr Dingwall shortly before the facts of the debt which you had hidden from me came to light.
  17. BrahimHemdani
    I am not sure that I can agree with all your politics but I like your conclusion. One can look back to the Darien Scheme, the South Sea Bubble and in more recent times, the Technology Media and Telecommunications (TMT) and sub prime mortgage fiasco, as bubbles that were bound to burst. It does seem almost inevitable that as the rich get richer in football terms and it becomes more difficult for any club outside an increasingly small elite in Spain, Germany and England particularly to win the CL never mind their own leagues, that football's bubble will burst too.
  18. BrahimHemdani
    . An old boss of mine was want to say "Is this a fact, can you prove it's a fact; if you can't prove it's a fact, it is not a fact; so do not say it's a fact when you cannot prove it is a fact. Whilst I agree with D'Art that it is semantics to differentiate between "loan" and "debt"; the FACTS are as he described. Let's be absolutely clear, it is a FACT that I can prove that the word "loan" was first used in connection with the matter described, by the auditors; initially I used the word "debt" because in acccounting terms that is exactly what it was; the amount appeared as an unspecified debtor in the draft accounts and the exact nature of the debt was only revealed by then Treasurer, Christine Somerville, when I asked the question at the audit meeting.
  19. BrahimHemdani
    Andy, I am happy to pass those last three paras along and see if it influences them when they discuss it again tomorrow.
  20. BrahimHemdani
    Any examples that you can publish on here without this site getting sued?
  21. BrahimHemdani
    A bit of unnecessary hyperbole that does you case no good at all.
  22. BrahimHemdani
    Paul Murray was never credible as the Blue Knights or part of McCollCo; he's one of yesterday's men and I'm sure deep down he knows it. On the second point, I agree completely, too many cooks and all that......
  23. BrahimHemdani
    Fan influence might be a better aspiration at least in the first instance.
  24. BrahimHemdani
    You are 100 % correct on both points; though it has to be said that the second is with the benefit of hindsight. RST have to be commended for the intiative but it is simply a fact that they did not raise a fraction of the money required, 25x as many shares were bought by fans direct.
  25. BrahimHemdani
    I exchanged two further emails with my connection yesterday evening. I think he was quite taken aback at some of the comments and feels that they "won't win either way" However I have put it to him that they should consider being a little more forthcoming especially as Q (11) is dear to supporters hearts and (14) is fundamental because most supporters would see the needs of a football club as being somewhat different from a normal company and whilst football clubs re supposed to be businesses these days not many are run that way. He came back to say that: "That's the difference as a fan it is emotion! As an investor we take away the emotion. I will discuss with Hugh on Monday and get back to you then."
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