Controversy continues to dog Sepp Blatter as Wednesday media reports claimed that the FIFA honcho has been provisionally suspended for 90 days by the world governing body's ethics committee, only for the Swiss power broker's attorney to robustly refute that idea in remarks to the New York Times.
Blatter is currently the subject of an investigation by Swiss authorities into a “disloyal payment” of 2 million Swiss francs ($2.05 million) made to UEFA president Michel Platini for contract work between 1999 and 2002, with potential charges against Blatter termed “criminal mismanagement or misappropriation.”
FIFA's independent ethics committee is mulling a suspension while the investigation proceeds, a process that would be initiated by the committee's investigatory chamber and ratified by its adjudicatory, led by veteran German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert. Sky Sports reported on Wednesday that the first part of that process had been completed, though Blatter's attorney Richard Cullen quickly denied it.
“Mr. Blatter has not been notified of any action by the ethics committee,” Cullen told the Times, “and we would expect that he would have the opportunity to be heard before any decision could be made.”
Blatter has denied any wrongdoing and called the charges against him “outrageous” in an interview with a German magazine this week.
“The situation is not pleasant,” Blatter told Bunte magazine. “I am being condemned without there being any evidence for wrongdoing on my part.”
Blatter previously announced that he would step down from the presidency, an office he's held since June 1998, once a successor is selected at a FIFA “Extraordinary Congress” later this year.
Adjudicatory chamber member Abdoulaye Makhtar Diop, of Senegal, said in a statement on Wednesday that the cases of Mr. Blatter and Platini – who is seen as leading candidate to succeed Blatter – were being considered by the ethics committee, which is seeking further information from Swiss investigators.
