\t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t \t\t\t\t\t Argentine Football Association (AFA) president Claudio \u201cChiqui\u201d Tapia was summoned for questioning by the Argentine judiciary on Thursday.<\/p>\n
The decision is connected to recent news that the Customs Collection and Control Agency (ARCA, in Spanish) revealed that the AFA allegedly failed to deposit tax withholdings and social security contributions for more than AR$19,350 trillion (just over US$13 billion), according to local media reports.<\/p>\n
Tapia isn\u2019t the only AFA top brass to be summoned. AFA treasurer and Tapia right-hand man Pablo Toviggino has also been called, as well as current general secretary Cristian Malaspina and his predecessor V\u00edctor Blanco.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The ruling, made by Economic Criminal Court No. 5 Judge Diego Amarante, also bans all involved from leaving the country before questioning. Hearings are set to run from\u00a0 March 5 and 9.<\/p>\n
AFA\u2019s response The AFA issued a statement defending Tapia and the institution\u2019s position while also suggesting they are being singled out by control agencies.<\/p>\n
The Argentine football governing body insisted it has \u201cno outstanding debt for the tax obligations that have been used as grounds for the complaint,\u201d claiming the payment has already been made.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It added that it has all been dealt with in a case that is pending resolution by an appeals court.<\/p>\n
The communiqu\u00e9 added that ARCA\u2019s actions are \u201cin open contradiction to legal norms\u201d as the agency \u201ccannot collect\u201d on the obligations they\u2019re claiming. The document highlighted that AFA is \u201cthe only entity to have\u00a0 been criminally charged by ARCA to date,\u201d from among \u201call non-profit entities currently operating in our country [which] are in the same tax and social security situation.\u201d<\/p>\n
The AFA-ARCA war The request for questioning issued against\u00a0 Tapia and other AFA high-ranking officials is the latest chapter in a long war between the tax bureau and Argentine football\u2019s governing body.<\/p>\n
In January, ARCA accused AFA of falsifying invoices in order to move\u00a0 over AR$376 million (just over US$253,000) out of the country without proper documentation between 2023 and 2025.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In their complaint, ARCA said the transfers may be \u201cdesigned to conceal the real destination of the money and violate existing fiscal control mechanisms.\u201d The AFA filed a suit alleging abuse of authority.<\/p>\n
Claudio \u201cChiqui\u201d Tapia himself has been in hot water over allegations of a string of financial misdeeds. The accusations include claims that a financial company was used to channel improper transactions and that its leaders attempted to hide ownership of a huge mansion in Buenos Aires province through frontmen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Argentine Football Association (AFA) president Claudio \u201cChiqui\u201d Tapia was summoned for questioning by the Argentine judiciary on Thursday. The decision is connected to recent news that the Customs Collection and Control Agency (ARCA, in Spanish) revealed that the AFA allegedly failed to deposit tax withholdings and social security contributions for more than AR$19,350 trillion (just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":37080,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2890,5788,2885,67],"tags":[4351,10214,4493,1369],"class_list":["post-37079","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-afa","category-arca","category-claudio-chiqui-tapia","category-sports","tag-afa","tag-arca","tag-claudio-chiqui-tapia","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37079","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37079"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37079\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37079"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37079"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/service.codeus.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37079"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}