Kelong Kings: Confessions of the world's most prolific match-fixer (29 page)

"I'm just
relaying what Admir said", Murugan shrugged his shoulders.

"Assuming that
they had a copy of my record", I objected, "they still
wouldn't have the details on the nature of my offenses. The file
would just say: Section 350 of the penal code. Period".

I put two and two
together and realized that maybe Dan was not too comfortable with me
going to Slovenia and meeting his partners.

"Fuck
you Murugan", I said, "you think I'm a small boy or what?
The immigration you're talking about is none other
than
Dan. He thinks that I'm going to go down there and take his business
away or something, so he poisoned these guys. It must be Dan, that
mother-fucker".

Dan does a lot of
things on impulse, without thinking. I suppose that he may not have
been able to sleep in peace after issuing my ticket. He probably
walked home and began thinking: "Fuck, did I make a big mistake
by sending Wilson to Slovenia? Fuck, this fellow is capable of taking
my business away from me".

Dan and I didn't
know each other very well at that stage, so he had probably spoken to
Admir, Dino and Vinko about me behind my back.

"Be careful
with this guy", he probably told them, "he's very
dangerous, he's got a criminal record. He's a violent person".

We are people who
like to make money but we are not violent. Dan, Admir and Dino are
not violent either, and that's probably why Admir called Murugan.

"Has this guy
been to prison before?"
he
asked.

I didn't have any
interest in undercutting Dan's business. I'm sure that I could have
done it, but it's not my style; it's not in my nature to go behind my
partner's back and steal his business. I have my business, you have
yours; I may not have a flawless character but I do have certain
principles. Plus, I didn't know the degree of trust that there was
between Dan and his European associates. If I had opened my mouth and
said, "Why don't I introduce you guys to another guy who can
offer you better odds", I would have looked bad from every
angle. I wasn't brought up to fuck someone who has been nice to me; I
fuck with people who fuck with me.

But Dan was
nonetheless paranoid.

"Mother-fuckers",
he must have thought, "they'll undercut me".

On October 10
^th
,
2008, I was back in business: I brought Pakistan to Malaysia for an
international friendly match.

"We hardly have
a team at all", the Pakistan FA said over the telephone. "Take
my word for it, our team is so weak that there is a good chance of
you winning without us doing anything".

When Pakistan
arrived in Kuala Lumpur, I tried to convince the players to lose the
match but they were not up to it.

"Noooo, nooo",
they all said.

Cricket fixing is so
rife in Pakistan and India
but
when it comes to football, you cannot corrupt a Pakistani or an
Indian player. Their nations are rated as some of the most corrupt in
the world but their footballers cannot be bought. Either way, the
match was not picked up for betting, making us incur a substantial
business loss.

After the Pakistan
match, Dan, Admir, Dino and I began planning the 2008 Merdeka Cup,
which was to be played in Malaysia in October. Once again, we offered
the Malaysia FA the opportunity to feature two foreign national teams
in the tournament free of charge. World Wide Events and Sports
International would have absorbed the price of their tickets.

Dan and his partners
had put their European business on hold to turn their attention to
the Merdeka Cup. Admir and Dino had become Dan's partners and would
travel with him anywhere that money could be made. By then, they and
Dan had become the shareholders of a match-fixing syndicate.

"Come, there is
money to be made", Dan would propose, "I'll give you a
share".

The two foreign
teams that we provided for the 2008 Merdeka Cup were Sierra Leone and
Mozambique. Both of them were Under-20 teams. I didn't need to fly to
Sierra Leone, they were not a problem. While fixing the Sierra Leone
match in South Africa in June of that year, I had built a
relationship with one of the Sierra Leone FA's officials, a guy
called Abu Bakar. A few months before the cup, I sent Abu Bakar an
e-mail.

"Just assemble
a team", it read, "I will pay the FA, I will pay for
everything. Wilson Raj".

Abu Bakar assembled
a Sierra Leone team that could dance to our tune and sent them over
to Malaysia.

I didn't go to
Maputo, Mozambique, either. Somehow I got in touch with somebody from
the Mozambique FA by telephone, an English-speaker.

"We would like
to invite Mozambique to play in a friendly football tournament in
Malaysia", I explained, "is it possible for you to come and
participate? We will pay for the delegation's tickets and for your
accommodation".

Then I proceeded to
cautiously describe the possibility of making good money while in
Malaysia.

"Would you all
be interested?" I inquired.

"Get us the
airline tickets first", was their reply.

We
were almost there, but we needed the money for the airline tickets
and Dan couldn't come up with enough cash to fly both teams in at
once. Sierra Leone was supposed to travel first and play against
Malaysia, but since Mozambique would not agree to participate until
they had the tickets in hand, they were placed in the fast lane and
landed in Malaysia first for their match against Bangladesh.
I
met the Mozambique coach and his assistant in the Grand Bluewave Shah
Alam Hotel before the match and instructed them.

"OK", I
explained, "we are hitting on a total of three goals and all of
them have to be scored during the second half of the match. You can
score or you can concede, it's up to you".

The coach agreed to
follow my instructions, so I handed him an advance payment of five
thousand US dollars.

Mozambique vs
Bangladesh was played on the evening of October 16
^th
,
2008. I was sitting on Mozambique's bench and was running the show
from there while Dino sat in the stands with Murugan.

When Dino saw me
sitting on the bench next-to the coach he exclaimed: "What the
fuck? You mean, you can sit on the bench? This could never happen in
Europe. It's totally ridiculous".

He was shocked and
was laughing uncontrollably when I called him.

"Fuck", he
said, "there is live betting and you're sitting on the bench and
using a mobile phone, saying: 'How many goals do you want?' Fuck,
give us three goals".

While Dino, Murugan
and I were at the stadium watching the match, Dan, Admir, Dan's agent
and his Chinese money-courier Poh Chee Leng were in a hotel room in
front of a computer clicking on the website to place their bets; they
were placing the bets on their own at that point because the
relationship between Dan and Harry had deteriorated.

The first half of
the match ended nil-nil. Then the second half started and, after five
minutes, I turned to speak to the coach.

"We need three
goals. It doesn't matter which team scores them", I reminded
him. "Can you get your team to concede? We're running out of
time, either you score or you concede".

He just sat there
like an idiot, not doing anything. I could tell that he was not the
least bothered by what I was saying to him.

"Look here",
I insisted, "I can give you an extra. An additional 10-15
thousand dollars, but can you please make sure that we get the three
goals?"

"Can you give
me the money now?" he suddenly replied.

"What the fuck!
How can I give you the money now? After the game".

The coach just sat
there watching the match and not doing anything to get us our three
goals. I withheld myself from landing a punch straight into his face.
Then, to make matters worse, one of the officials from the Malaysian
FA came over to me.

"Excuse me,
sir", he said, "your name is not on the team list, you
cannot sit here, you need to leave the bench".

I had no choice but
to leave the bench and could not play on the scene anymore. There was
nothing left for me to do. The match ended 1-0 in favor of
Mozambique. They scored a late goal and we lost our bet.

We were all
depressed as we sat in the car on our way back to the hotel. We had
no life in our bodies; sometimes losing a bet can do that to you. I
was sitting in the back seat with Murugan, while Dino was sitting in
the passenger seat.

"Fuck that",
I ran the story over in my head, "we paid the team, we paid the
FA, we brought them all the way here. Fuck, we even gave them a
deposit, and it's all fucked".

The whole thing did
not reflect well on me at all; I looked hopeless. Then Dino's phone
rang, it was somebody calling him from Slovenia. Dino was silent for
a short while, then he uttered:
"Katastrofa".

It's catastrophe,
but in Slovenian it's 'katastrofa'.

I looked at Murugan
and he looked at me, we wanted to laugh, but couldn't. I was really
pissed off at the Mozambique coach. That night Murugan and I did not
return to the hotel; I knew that Dan's agent was furious and I didn't
want to face him just yet. He had asked me before the match if I
could call the match off in case of a fuck up like I had done with
Togo and I had said 'yes'. But the mother-fucking coach was like a
buffalo who would not budge. Throughout the entire night Murugan and
I received non-stop calls from Dan who kept asking us what the fuck
had happened, then, in the morning, we decided to return to the hotel
and face Dan's agent. As soon as I walked in their room, Dan's agent
rushed towards me and held me
by
the throat. I pushed him away and we were about to
exchange blows when Dan and Admir stepped in and separated us. I left
the room and went downstairs. Dan came with me.

"Wilson",
he asked, "why can't you just relax and let him vent
out
his anger?"

"I didn't fuck
you guys up", I said to Dan. "I didn't double cross you.
Things just didn't play out the way I thought that they would. The
coach fucked me up".

"Let's just
focus on the remaining matches", said Dan. "We'll find a
way out of this mess".

Next, I went up to
the coach's room with the intention of hammering the fucker but
Murugan tried to calm me down.

"Brother",
he said, "stop, stop. If you hit him, things will blow out of
proportion and we may not be able to continue with our plan".

I wanted to fix the
mother-fucker up. It was the first time in my life that I found
myself in a situation where somebody has taken my money and then made
a fool out of me. I kept playing the scene at the stadium over and
over in my mind.

"I can give you
an additional 10-15 thousand if you want", I had told him, "you
either score or you concede".

"Where's the
money? Can I have it now?" he replied.

How would you feel?
Either you take the money and do the job or you don't take the money,
but he was just sitting there on the bench with my money in his
pocket doing nothing.

"Fuck",
the more I thought about it, the more I was enraged, "I'm going
to put some cannabis into this mother-fucker's bag and send him to
the airport, then I'll tip off the customs. Three days in a cell,
then he will realize".

Finally, Murugan
managed to calm me down and I returned to my room.

Fortunately, Sierra
Leone was on its way to Kuala Lumpur for their first match against
Malaysia. Abu Bakar was our mouthpiece to Sierra Leone and had a
strong sway over all of their players. I could not approach them and
speak to them directly, it had to be done through Abu Bakar because
the boys respected him.

After the first fuck
up, Admir, Dino and Dan all decided to come along to my meeting with
Abu Bakar. None of us could afford another loss, so we spoke to him
clearly.

"Look here",
I said, "we need four goals, all in the second half. You can
either score or concede. Since you've just landed from a long flight,
it's better if you concede".