Kelong Kings: Confessions of the world's most prolific match-fixer Read online

  "Did Danny run away with my money?" he asked.

  Fuck. Somehow Pal had found out about the whole story, probably from some common friends with big mouths.

  "No, he didn't", I said. "The Nigerians kept your money".

  "OK", stated Pal, "I don't want to know who ran off with my money, I am not interested. You owe me that money".

  And that's how I became indebted to Pal.

  A few days later, I received a call from a referee called Ramasamy who knew me from the bookies corner in Jalan Besar stadium. He knew that I was a punter and that I was involved in match-fixing. Ramasamy was in dire need for cash.

  "Wilson", he said, "I have a lot of parking tickets and I don't know how to pay them. Can you lend me ten thousand dollars? I will pay you back or I can do something else for you".

  "I don't have that kind of money with me", I said to him, "but let me talk to Pal and see if he wants to help you out".

  I called Pal.

  "Hey boss", I said, "there's a ref who wants to borrow money from you".

  "Let me speak to him", Pal replied.

  I gave Pal's number to Ramasamy and the two spoke; I had no clue about what transpired between them over the telephone but, a few days later, Ramasamy called me to say that he was going to speak with Pal in person. Ramasamy and I decided to meet at the Clementi Café in downtown Singapore before his rendez-vous with the boss. From there, we hitched a ride with a Chinese friend towards Yishun, where Pal was waiting for us. I told my Chinese friend to stop by the train station, where I climbed out of the car. Pal was still pestering me for the 80 thousand dollars that Danny had stolen, so I preferred not to see him. After the meeting with Pal, Ramasamy and my Chinese friend came back to pick me up at the station.

  "How much did Pal give you?" I asked Ramasamy.

  "Pal wasn't there", Ramasamy replied. "There was another man. He fished five hundred dollars from his pocket and gave them to me. I asked the man: 'What the fuck? Only five hundred?' But he just nodded and left".

  A few hours later, while I was at home in Woodlands, I received a call from Pal.

  "Wilson, where are you?" he asked.

  "Home, boss".

  "Wait for me there", he commanded. "I'm coming to pick you up. We're going to meet your referee at the Concorde Hotel on Orchard road".

  Soon a car was honking its horn in front of my home. I walked out, hopped in the car and took a seat. Immediately, I recognized Tan William, the head-man of Ang Soon Tong, Pal's trade group, sitting in the front seat next to his driver. Pal was sitting in the back seat beside me to my left. As soon as the car began moving, Pal turned to me.

  "Hey Wilson", he said with an unusually humble tone, "tell William that we took Tunisia against Portugal in Atlanta. Tell him how on that game we were eating ball".

  "Mother-fucker!" I thought. "Pal had lied even to the head-man of his own gang. Dirty, arrogant mother-fucker".

  I didn't want to land him into trouble.

  "Sure", I said as I turned towards William and smiled, "those Tunisian fuckers really fucked us up".

  If the triad guys had known the truth, they would have ripped Pal's testicles apart.

  William's driver parked in front of the Concorde Hotel and we sat inside the car for almost half an hour waiting for Ramasamy to arrive. Finally he showed up, apologized to Pal for the delay and claimed that he was coming from a meeting that had run late. Ramasamy stood by the car's window as Pal instructed him without leaving his seat.

  "The next match", said Pal, "Police FC vs Sembawang Rangers FC, I want the Police team to win by two clear goals".

  Ramasamy nodded, then Pal gave me a shove and asked me to tell the ref not to fuck up. I repeated Pal's instructions to him.

  On the day of the match between Police FC and Sembawang Rangers FC, our ref delivered the perfect job. The Sembawang coach was furious with Ramasamy, who disallowed a clean goal, allowing the Police team to win by two goals as Pal had ordered. After the match, Pal arranged for the payment to be delivered to Ramasamy's sister through my friend Mike.

  Meanwhile, Ah Seng, the Hai Lok San bookie who had lent money to Pal before the Olympics only to receive a bogus tip in return, was enraged and was looking for Pal left and right.

  "I want to kill the fucker", he was heard saying, "I want to stab the mother-fucker and kill him".

  Somehow, through the good offices of William, Pal managed to get in touch with the head-man of the Hai Lok San, Ah Seng's trade group. The four of them sat down around a table and managed to appease Ah Seng; they convinced him not to take revenge against Pal and his life was spared.

  Later that year I traveled to Chennai, the capital of Tamil-Nadu, one of the southernmost states in India; I wanted to see my land of origin. India is a massive country and southern Indians are mostly Tamils. In the 18th century, the British brought many Tamils to South Africa, the Fiji islands, the Caribbean and Malaysia to work in their sugar plantations as cheap labor and that's how my family ended up in Singapore. This was my first true holiday. I checked into a 3-star hotel for three nights and then came back. I had no specific place to visit in mind, so I just went to the beach and observed the daily lives of the ordinary people around me. I felt sorry for the many poor living in the streets, for kids running around without decent clothes to wear and for the many beggars sitting outside the temples; I was heartbroken. On a different note, the food was excellent and there were plenty of side dishes; had I lived in India, I could have turned into a vegetarian without any difficulties. I enjoyed my time in India but could never settle there; It is too polluted, hot and back-dated. Indians look down upon fellow Indians and still live by the caste system; although it is prohibited by the law, it is nonetheless very hard to take it out of the people.

  "Fuck the law", they will say, "this caste will never marry into this other caste".

  Fortunately, castes do not exist in Malaysia or Singapore; we go to school together, we play football together, we eat together and marry each other freely. We don't fucking care which caste one belongs to.

  Zimbabwe vs Bosnia and Herzegovina, February 24th, 1997, the Dunhill Cup in Malaysia, was the first international match that I fixed. After my trip to India I was left with only three thousand dollars in my pocket and, instead of gambling them away, I decided to put that amount to good use. The Dunhill Cup was a friendly international tournament with no bearing for the teams involved and I decided to try my luck with the Zimbabwean players. I knew that these black guys were dirt-poor and could be corrupted so I decided to approach them. By then I was not that close to Pal anymore, but if there was business to be done, neither of us would hesitate to join hands, so before leaving for Malaysia I called him up.

  "Boss", I asked. "What if I make an attempt with the Zimbabwean team?".

  "I am in control of that team", barked Pal. "You keep away from them".

  I didn't buy his words; I could tell from his tone of voice that he was lying. Pal had power when he had money but without money, he was like a balloon without air.

  On the following day I traveled to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, where I met a friend called Thana. Thana was a former player for the Malaysian club Kedah FC and had been the hottest young striker in their lineup during the Malaysia Cup years. In 1993, when Thana was among the club's top scorers, Pal had helped the Kedah state team win the cup against Singapore. Unfortunately for Thana, his career had ended prematurely when he was arrested by Malaysian authorities during the 1994 anti-corruption sweep and banned from the game by the Malaysian FA. He was in his early 20's when we had first met in Pal's office in 1995 and had become good friends. Thana and I had learned about Zimbabwe's whereabouts from the local papers and soon managed to get in touch with one of their players. Thana didn't want to run any risks and refused to attend my meeting with him. I met the player on my own and told him that I was a football agent, took him out for dinner and then put him on a shopping spree; it felt like a first date. Then I made my offer.

  "Would
you be happy to receive 100 thousand US dollars to lose a game?" I asked.

  "Extremely happy", was his reply.

  "The 100 thousand is not meant for you alone", I clarified, "but for five or six of you who can be trusted to work for me. Do you think that you can arrange for me to meet the others?"

  "Sure I can", he said.

  On the following day, the Zimbabwean player brought five of his teammates to my hotel room. One of them was extremely cautious and kept asking questions.

  "We don't know whether you are a policeman or not", he argued.

  "I'm not a policeman", I answered. "Look at my passport, I am a Singaporean who has come to Malaysia. Look at the places where I travel. This is my profession: I fix matches, I approach people. Either you want to do business or you don't".

  That point settled, they agreed to my proposal.

  "We are ready to do the job", they said. "How much will you pay us?"

  "I'll pay you 100 thousand US dollars to lose the match against Bosnia. I'll give you a 30 thousand dollar deposit that you can hold on to, the rest will be delivered to you on the day following the match".

  "OK, no problem", they replied. "What score do you want?"

  "I'll give out the precise instructions on the day of the game but it should not be any more than a 2-0 defeat".

  "OK".

  The five Zimbabweans all agreed. I called Pal again; although he had lied to me about controlling Zimbabwe, I knew that he would not pass a good business opportunity.

  "Listen", I told Pal, "I have Zimbabwe and they can work. You want to work with them or not?"

  "OK", said Pal. "What do they want?"

  "30 thousand dollar deposit, 70 thousand after the game".

  "OK. Do it, no problem", said Pal. "Get things done".

  Pal sent one of his runners, a guy called Simon, to Kuala Lumpur with the 30 thousand dollars in cash. I took the money from Simon and handed it over to the players. Pay careful attention to this: five guys; everything was set; the odds were Bosnia giving one-and-a-half, meaning Bosnia to win over Zimbabwe by two goals. Pal had not come to Malaysia in person but had one of his Chinese investors in the stadium watching the match while I was running the show. Pal called me before kick off.

  "Close the first half on 0-0", he instructed, "then concede four goals in the second half".

  Four goals? Honestly, I don't know why Pal asked for such a huge goal difference; two goals would have been enough for us to win good money. Bosnia was already the favorite; their players were huge compared to the Zimbabwean boys.

  The game kicked off and Zimbabwe was set to lose but around the 20th minute they netted a goal and took the lead. I had misjudged the Zimbabweans; they were actually much better than the Bosnian players. The first half closed 1-0 for Zimbabwe and I was starting to grow nervous. Then, in the second half, Bosnia scored twice within a ten-minute time span and went ahead 2-1, mainly because my five boys in the Zimbabwean team were performing way below their standard. I needed another goal from Bosnia to clear the handicap but suddenly, at the 75th minute of game-play, the Zimbabwean player who was asking a lot of questions about me being a policeman volleyed the ball from 40 meters out and, to everyone's surprise, landed it straight into the Bosnian net. 2-2. What followed was the strangest goal celebration that I've ever seen in my entire life. The Zimbabwean player brought his hands to his head as if to say: "Fuck. What have I done".

  Then all five players, my five guys, gathered like a rugby scrum and started talking in circle right in the middle of the pitch.

  "What the fuck do we do now?" they thought.

  First timers; so fucking unprofessional. After the ref's whistle sealed the 2-2 final scoreline, I received a call from Pal.

  "What the fuck did your people do?" he shouted.

  No excuses can pacify a losing punter; when things go wrong, people have a bag filled with excuses but the bosses seldom have the patience to listen to them.

  "Do you know how much we lost?" yelled Pal. "What the fuck!"

  Fortunately, the Chinese investor who was at the stadium came to my rescue, telling Pal that the Zimbabwean player who had scored was behaving abnormally; that he appeared genuinely desperate after the goal and that, overall, the game seemed to be fixed. Pal called me again and ordered me to recover the 30 thousand dollar deposit from the Zimbabwean players. I met the players and took the money from them, only to gamble it all away that same night at the casino. On the following day, Pal called again to say that he had sent his runner Simon to retrieve the cash from me; he told me that Simon would meet me at one o'clock in the afternoon on the following day. At that point, with no excuses left in my bag, I went missing.

  After the fuck up with Pal, I was left without a financier for the remaining Dunhill Cup matches so my friend Thana asked if he could bring a bookie over to see me for Zimbabwe's coming match against Vietnam.

  "Bring him over", I told Thana.

  I was broke anyways.

  Thana introduced me to his friend Yap, alias David, a hair stylist from Alor Setar and one of the biggest runners in Malaysia at the time, and to Yap's Chinese friend, another runner from Alor Setar by the name of Boon. Yap and Boon were business partners and bookmakers but in this business a bookie can easily turn into a fixer.

  "Do you have Zimbabwe?" Yap and Boon inquired. "Can you arrange a meeting with the players? For every game that your boss fixes we're ready to cover your bets for up to 300 thousand Malaysian Ringgit per match".

  Yap and Boon had no idea that there was no 'boss' behind me anymore. To 'cover' my wager meant that I wouldn't have had to repay them in case of a loss. In other words, the 300 thousand Ringgit were my cut for providing the bookies with the information on a fixed match. It was a good offer for someone who was penniless like me; in 1997, 300 thousand Ringgit was roughly 120 thousand US dollars.

  "So Yap", I double checked, "you can place 300 thousand Ringgit on the match against Vietnam?"

  "No problem", he confirmed.

  The odds were three-ball in favor of Zimbabwe. I briefly introduced the players to Yap and Boon in their hotel room and then dictated my instructions to the Zimbabwean boys.

  "Make sure we win the match by four goals or more", I said confidently.

  I knew that they were good enough to destroy Vietnam and offered them 50 thousand Ringgit in case of success. As expected, Zimbabwe clobbered Vietnam by a whopping 6-0.

  During the match I spotted Simon, Pal's runner, pacing nervously up and down in the grandstands looking for me. Then I saw Pal. I think that he was out on bail at the time and had probably left Singapore with his brother's passport or something. Before I could split from the scene he saw me and started screaming in my direction.

  "Wilson", he shrieked. "Where the fuck is my 30 thousand?"

  He was furious and I needed to find a quick and plausible explanation to appease him.

  "Sorry Boss", I said, "the players bought a bunch of electronic devices with your money and had none left to pay us back".

  "I want to see them tomorrow", growled Pal. "Arrange a meeting with them".

  That same night I collected my win from Yap and paid the 50 thousand Ringgit to the players. Zimbabwe had made it past the group stage and was set to play the Dunhill Cup semi-final against China. I arranged a meeting with the players, as Pal had requested, and he came to speak to them.

  "What the fuck happened against Bosnia?" he asked the Zimbabweans.

  The boys hung their heads. Pal was wearing a thick gold chain; he took it off and placed it on the team captain's neck.

  "Don't fuck me up this time around", he admonished. "You will do as I say. I want you to lose by two goals".

  "All right boss", they replied. "We will. No problem".

  Everything was ready, then Yap came looking for me once again, landing himself in a trap that I had no intention of setting up for him.

  "Does your boss want to throw any bets on the next game?" he asked.

  I didn't want
to sound desperate, so I took my time.

  "Let me talk to him about it and get back to you", I said.

  I left, walked for ten minutes or so around the block, then came back to him.

  "My boss asks how much you can place for him" I asked Yap.

  "Half a million Ringgit is no problem", he replied.

  "That is too little", I waved his offer away with my hand. "My boss will require at least one million from you or else we're going to look for another bookie".

  "OK, OK", Yap conceded, "no problem. I'll cover your million".

  Pal was betting on one side and I was betting on the other with Yap's money. I hit the match with one million Ringgit, roughly 400 thousand US dollars. So what will the odds be? China was giving one-ball, everybody was pushing and the odds were supposed to rise but something was not right: the odds for China dropped from one-ball to half-ball instead of moving up to one-and-a-half. This meant that the Chinese were also doing business. Pal called me.

  "Fuck!" he exclaimed "What's going on? Everybody is eating here. Check if China is doing business".

  I sat in the stadium before the start of the fixture with my fingers crossed. If I were to lose, I was ready to jet and disappear. I would have flown to India; I've seen many guys in the betting circle default their payments and take off to Thailand or Cambodia; I was prepared to run the risk.

  The match kicked off and, after the first 20 minutes of game-play, I could tell that China had no intention of scoring. Our Zimbabwean boys were looking in the other direction but the Chinese were just blasting the ball in the stands. There was a massive competition going on behind the scenes; a competition between two bosses. Pal wanted Zimbabwe to lose and some other boss wanted the same result of China. It was raining and our boys were slipping and sliding every which way. Eventually China gave up and scored; they hit a soft header and my boys just slipped and fell. Final score: 3-1 for China. I don't know who was fighting Pal on that day, but Chinese teams have been under the control of match-fixing syndicates for a long time.

  I won my first million Ringgit from the match, plus the 300 thousand Ringgit Yap and Boon had paid for my information. Pal won his bet too but decided not to pay any money to the players.