Football referees in Nigeria can
take bribes from clubs but should not allow them to influence
their decisions on the pitch, a football official said on
Friday.Fanny Amun, acting Secretary-General of the Nigerian
Football Association, said bribery was common in the Nigerian
game."We know match officials are offered money or anything to
influence matches and they can accept it," Amun told Reuters on
Friday…"Referees should only pretend to fall for the bait, but make
sure the result doesn’t favour those offering the bribe," Amun
said.
Here is the full story, and thanks to David (not Tom) Williamson for the pointer.
Hmm, that sounds like a good way to get yourself beat up as a ref.
On the other hand, not taking a bribe could be a good way to get yourself beat up…
If some refs accept bribes but then ref fairly, it decreases the effectiveness of bribing at the margin.
Amateur Analysis: To build upon Tom’s comment, when this happens profits will decrease for referies who ref fairly. Thus, the financial incentive is to reward the highest bidding customer with favorable calls. Or am I missing something?
Is it an overreaction to compare the integrity of congresspeople to African soccer referees? I hope so, but suspect not in many cases.
A post on the economics of American Congressional bribery would be very interesting.
Jake,
“Is it an overreaction to compare the integrity of congresspeople to African soccer
referees? I hope so, but suspect not in many cases.”
Yes, it is an overreaction. Congress has never had as much integrity as a bribed referee.
cheers,
-hamilton
That was actually Sir Francis Bacon’s defense when he was a judge: he took the bribes, but decided the cases the same way he would have regardless.
Didn’t work for him ….
Old pols in the US used to have a saying like “If you can’t shake their hands, take their money, screw their women, and then vote against them, you’re not doing your job.”
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