FIFA’s ethics judges are set to hear a defence in the allegations against UEFA chief Michel Platini on Friday, although the Frenchman will not be there to argue his case after vowing to boycott the hearing.
The Platini hearing follows an appearance at the same FIFA court by world football’s suspended president Sepp Blatter, who spent more than eight hours at FIFA’s Zurich headquarters being questioned in a corruption case that may end his career.
Both Blatter and Platini, a FIFA vice president, were suspended in October after Swiss prosecutors opened a criminal investigation looking partly into a $2 million/€1.8 million payment made to Platini in 2011 for work carried out about a decade earlier.
The two men – once the most powerful figures in world football – face longer suspensions in a verdict expected from FIFA ethics judges early next week.
Platini has said the verdict has been decided in advance and he will therefore not show up. He will be represented by his lawyers.
FIFA’s ethics judges have dismissed Platini’s claims of a pre-determined verdict and pledged to review the evidence against him fairly. Before his own hearing, Blatter launched similar criticisms against the FIFA court, but still appeared in his own defence, accompanied by his Zurich-based lawyer Lorenz Erni.
Neither men spoke to the dozens of journalists gathered outside FIFA on Thursday, but shortly after the hearing Blatter’s Virginia-based lawyer Richard Cullen issued a statement calling for an acquittal.
“President Blatter looks forward to a decision in his favour, because the evidence requires it,” Cullen said in an email sent to AFP.
“President Blatter behaved properly and certainly did not violate FIFA’s Code of Ethics. This investigation should be closed and the suspension lifted,” Cullen added.
Both Blatter and Platini deny wrongdoing. If convicted, appeals to a FIFA’s appeal committee and the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) are possible for both men.
As Blatter exited FIFA’s headquarters on Thursday, possibly for the last time, his temporary replacement warned that the unprecedented storm surrounding the organisation may not be over.