By Allon Lee
BRIMBANK mayor Natalie Suleyman has threatened to sue opposition local government spokesperson John Vogels if he repeats his claims made against her outside of State Parliament.
Cr Suleyman was responding to Mr Vogels’ call for an independent investigation to determine whether she failed to disclose a potential conflict of interest.
“John Vogels should come out of … Parliament where he is protected because I would sue him quite bluntly on the basis that he hasn’t got his facts straight,” Cr Suleyman told Star.
Cr Suleyman repeated her insistence that Albion Rovers Soccer Club and Albion Junior Soccer Club were separate clubs when she voted in favour of council spending $650,000 to relocate the juniors to Cairnlea on 8 March.
Cr Suleyman failed to disclose that her father, Hakki Suleyman, was Albion Rovers’ public officer in 2000, and her brother, Mehmet Suleyman, was a committee member when she voted to move the club.
“My father is not associated with the Albion Junior Soccer Club, nor any of my family members,” she told Star last week.
As Star reported exclusively on 26 April, after the council voted in favour of relocating Albion Junior Soccer Club to Cairnlea on 8 March, the homepage of the Albion Rovers Soccer Club stated: “It’s official. Albion Rovers are moving to Cairnlea.”
Cr Suleyman still maintains the clubs are not linked. Albion Rovers Soccer Club thenpresident Mustafa Fikret told Star in March the committees for both seniors and juniors were identical.
According to Cr Suleyman, Albion Juniors is another name for Delahey Junior Soccer Club, which is incorporated. The council agreement was with Delahey Juniors, she said.
“Albion Juniors were incorporated as Delahey Junior Soccer Club due to the fact that they were going to be relocated to Delahey (Recreation Reserve) at the time (in 2003/04),” Cr Suleyman said last Friday.
But Mr Fikret said the Rovers, Albion juniors and Delahey juniors shared the same committee.
According to a Victorian Soccer Federation (now the Football Federation of Victoria) spokesperson in April, there was no record of the Delahey Junior Soccer Club playing in any competition.
The spokesperson said Albion Rovers and Albion Juniors were the same club.
