By Andrew Warshaw
September 8 – A ruling on the immediate futures of both Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini is expected to be made at around lunchtime Thursday following unconfirmed reports that a provisional 90-day suspension has been recommended for the respective presidents of both FIFA and UEFA.
It is understood that sanctions could be handed down by FIFA’s adjudicatory chamber, led by German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert, to four individuals in all – three suspensions and one ban, the last of these possibly against South Korea’s Chung Moon-Jong, like Platini a FIFA presidential candidate.
Reports that the investigatory chamber of FIFA’s ethics committee has called for arguably the two most influential powerbrokers in world football to be sanctioned have not been officially confirmed since the body is bound by strict confidentiality rules and must first inform the relevant parties.
If true, the 90-day suspension, which can be extended by 45 days at the discretion of the ethics committee, would last until January but would effectively bring an inglorious end to Blatter’s controversial 17-year tenure as head of football’s world governing body even though technically he may be able to return until the February 26 election to replace him.
Blatter, who ironically set up the two-chamber body to weed out corruption by others, has been clinging to power ever since the Swiss attorney general opened criminal proceedings against him for allegedly selling World Cup TV rights for below their true value. He is also accused of making a “disloyal payment” of SFr2 million to Platini in February 2011 for work the Frenchman carried out when he was Blatter’s technical advisor more than nine years earlier.
Both men deny any wrongdoing and in a statement Blatter’s lawyers said he had “not been notified of any action” by the ethics committee. “We would expect that the Ethics Committee would want to hear from the President and his council, and conduct a thorough review of the evidence, before making any recommendation to take disciplinary action.”
In what was a somewhat confusing picture, Blatter’s adviser Klaus Stohlker disclosed to Britain’s Press Association that a 90-day suspension had indeed been recommended though not ratified.
” These are times of trouble for him of course but he is feeling strong and confident,” Stohlker was quoted as saying. “There is no suspension active.”
Blatter told a German magazine Wednesday that he was “condemned without there being any evidence for wrongdoing” and has already rejected a request by a raft of FIFA’s American sponsors to step down now rather than wait until the February election.
In a way, however, a suspension would hurt Platini far more given his dream of succeeding his one-time mentor. Just hours before news of the prospective sanction was picked up by media organisations, Platini’s communications chief Pedro Pinto told reporters on the sidelines of the Leaders in Sport Business conference that his boss was still determined to run and had provided all the necessary information to the investigating authorities.
“The president currently feels that he has given satisfactory explanations to the authorities that are dealing with this case,” said Pinto. “Publicly, he feels there is nothing else to add because he feels he has does nothing wrong and therefore does not need to justify himself publicly at the moment.”
Franco Carraro, former chairman of FIFA’s internal audit committee, shed more doubt on the infamous SFr2 million payment, however. Carraro told La Repubblica: “I was the person checking the accounts, but I do not remember seeing an item of expenditure in favour of Platini for his consultancy. And the timing of the payment, being nine years late, is objectively abnormal.”
What is known amid all the statements and counter-statements, bluff and counter-bluff is that the ethics committee definitely met in Zurich, possibly at or near FIFA headquarters. It has also been reported that Eckert had to leave early because of ill-health. Senegal’s Abdoulaye Diop, a member of Eckert’s adjudicatory chamber, confirmed to his country’s state news agency that the cases of Blatter, Platini and Chung were all being dealt with, a disclosure – deliberate or otherwise – which subsequently spiralled and will not have gone down well with his colleagues.
Chung, who was Asia’s FIFA vice-president for 17 years until 2011, has admitted he could be banned for 15 years for his conduct in the build-up to the vote for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup even though he forcefully denies any wrongdoing.
Over the last two days, seemingly in a pre-emptive strike, Chung launched a ferocious attack on corruption and mismanagement within FIFA, in particular targeting Blatter and all but accusing the ethics committee of being in the pocket of the veteran Swiss, only ever dishing out punishment to less powerful officials.
Chung is convinced of a Blatter-orchestrated conspiracy against him running for president but those familiar with the workings of the ethics committee make the point that Chung’s own alleged misdemeanours were flagged up by Eckert in his summary of Michael Garcia’s infamous report into corruption surrounding the World Cup bid process back in November.
That was long before Chung even considered a bid to succeed Blatter and the billionaire Korean would have considerable egg on his face if the reported sanctions are rubber-stamped tomorrow.
Nominations for the FIFA presidency, let’s not forget, have to be submitted by October 26 with each candidate needing the support of at least five national associations though the election is now in danger of descending into farce.
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