German media reports claim the country’s football federation paid a €6.7-million ‘bribe’ to secure the rights to host the 2006 FIFA World Cup.

Germany beat South Africa 12-11 in the voting for that World Cup when New Zealand official Charles Dempsey infamously abstained from voting.
It is alleged that the money was used to secure four Asian votes on the 24-person FIFA Executive Committee, which swung the bid in Germany’s favour.
Spiegel reports that the DFB took a €6.7-million loan from then-Adidas CEO Robert Louis-Dreyfus and put it in a FIFA ‘slush’ fund that was supposedly meant to be used for a ‘FIFA cultural program’.
The DFB has admitted to making the payment to FIFA and said it is possible the payment was not used correctly. They also claim the payment had no connection to the awarding of the World Cup.
This is very similar to SAFA’s insistence not so long ago that a $10-million payment to Concacaf was not a bribe to secure bidding votes for the 2010 World Cup but was meant for the African Diaspora Legacy Trust.