Faria Alam, the Football Association secretary who had an affair with Sven-Göran Eriksson, today denied that she made up an allegation of sexual harassment against her boss just to scare the FA into settling a constructive dismissal claim.
Ms Alam, a Bangladeshi-born former model, was recalled to the stand on the final day of an employment tribunal in Central London, to explain a newspaper interview in which she appeared to directly contradict her allegation that she had been sexually harassed by David Davies, the FA executive director for whom she worked as a personal assistant.
In an interview given to the Mail on Sunday last year, but only published this week, Miss Alam appeared to dismiss suggestions of harassment. Asked if Mr Davies had “tried it on”, she told the newspaper: “No, no” and added: “I don’t see anything bad about him. We had a great rapport and I didn’t find him difficult to work for.”
The tribunal also heard testimony today from Alistair MacLean, the FA’s head of business and legal affairs, who went through the circumstances of her resignation last summer. Mr MacLean revealed that Ms Alam, who claims she did not resign in order to sell her story, signed media deals worth £300,000 just six minutes before she sent her resignation letter on August 5.
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Mr MacLean said documents detailing two £150,000 agreements with the News of The World and the Mail on Sunday were timed at 6.47pm. Ms Alam then faxed her resignation letter from the office of PR consultant Max Clifford at 6.53pm.
He said it was read out to a meeting of the FA committee which had been called to consider her position and that of Mr Eriksson. “The meeting concluded unanimously that Mr Eriksson had no case to answer,” he said.
Mr MacLean also said that Ms Alam denied her affair with the England coach no less than three times on the day after news of it was published.
Ms Alam, 39, was recalled to the stand at the request of the FA after the publication of the Mail on Sunday interview in which she described Mr Davies as a good man to work for.
In the previously unused interview material, culled from eight hours of talks with a reporter, she denied any suggestion that Mr Davies harassed her and said that he was “jovial and chatty”. That contradicted her statement last week that he had made “unwanted advances” and tried to hug and kiss her.
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Jeffrey Bacon, for the FA, said: “You simply told a lie, knowing you were telling a lie and you were expecting that it would never come out and you would get away with it.” Ms Alam said: “I am not trying to get away with anything.”
Mr Bacon pressed her and added that if the content of the interview was true, then “everything you said under oath was simply not true”.
Clearly shaken, Ms Alam repeatedly insisted she had not spoken of the alleged harassment last year because she did not want to bring up Mr Davies and because she felt sorry for his wife. “I didn’t want to bring anyone else into it and it is true he’s a good boss,” Ms Alam said.
Mr Bacon told her that if she had not been deceitful to the tribunal, then she must have been deceitful to the Mail on Sunday. She said: “I’m not being deceitful. I stand by what I said last year and I stand by what I said this year.”
Mr Bacon said if that was the case, she must still stand by the fact that Mr Davies did not “try it on” and put it to her that the newspaper interview was the truth.”You fabricated this evidence to try to scare the FA into settling with you,” he told the former secretary, referring to the harassment claim.
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Clearly troubled, Miss Alam shook her head and said: “No.”
Outside the court, her solicitor Nigel Forsyth said : “We are happy with the way things went, we feel we have had a fair hearing and we will have to wait to hear what the tribunal says.”
Ms Alam rolled her eyes when a reporter suggested that she had been depicted as a “gold-digger” and said only: “I’m going on holiday.” The tribunal was adjourned until July 26. A judgment is not expected before the middle of August.