By Andrew Warshaw
February 5 – Banned FIFA president Sepp Blatter could make a defiant farewell appearance at the Congress that will elect his successor – even if he has been unable to clear his name in time.
Blatter, banned for eight years along with Michel Platini, has long insisted that under FIFA rules, only its 209 member federations who elect a president can formally remove another at the same time.
FIFA’s ethics committee takes a different view and has the power to ban Blatter for even longer if he openly defies his punishment imposed for a range of misdemeanours, including conflict of interest in approving SFr2 million of FIFA money for Platini in 2011. The Frenchman is also appealing against his ban for accepting the money as uncontracted salary whilst working as Blatter’s presidential adviser from 1999-2002.
Switzerland’s attorney general has opened criminal proceedings against Blatter relating both to the Platini payment and allegedly being a party to FIFA allegedly selling 2010 and 2014 World Cup broadcasting rights for less than their true value.
Both Blatter and Platini are due to have their appeals heard next week, 10 days before the February 26 electoral congress. If they are cleared, which is unlikely, they will be free to attend the Congress anyway. If not, they are likely to take their respective cases to the Court of Arbitration for Sport which would take at least another fortnight.
Amid heightened speculation that Blatter, who has run FIFA for 18 years, is planning one last audacious surprise, his spokesman, Thomas Renggli, told the Associated Press he “should be present at the congress.”
“Only the congress, according to the statutes, can put Mr. Blatter out of his mandate,” Renggli said.
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