FIFA court opens case against Blatter, Platini

Decision in December

LAUSANNE: The judgement arm of FIFA’s ethics committee yesterday opened a case against the body’s suspended president Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini, with a verdict in the corruption allegations surrounding both men due next month.

The panel of judges, known as the adjudicatory chamber, received the final report from the ethics committee’s investigative branch on Saturday, which called for sanctions to be levelled against both men. A guilty verdict would almost certainly crush UEFA president Platini’s hopes of succeeding Blatter at the top of world football’s governing body. The investigative branch did not disclose the severity of the recommended sanctions, or the evidence collected, but both Blatter and Platini have been implicated in possible criminal conduct in a separate case launched by Swiss prosecutors.

In a statement, the adjudicatory chamber said it had “opened formal adjudicatory proceedings against Joseph S. Blatter and Michel Platini based on the final reports submitted by the investigatory chamber.” The chamber “intends to come to a decision in both cases during the month of December”, the statement further said.

FIFA’s ethics committee provisionally suspended both men-once the two most powerful figures in world footballfor 90 days in October. Blatter, Platini and their representatives can appear before the FIFA-appointed judges to mount a defence, while investigators can also make a presentation in the process that functions like an in-house court. — AFP