Respite has finally come for the embattled former FIFA President, Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini, his former right-hand man, as a Federal Court in Bellinzona, Switzerland, on Friday acquitted them of corruption charges following an 11-day trial.
After an investigation that lasted six years and cost both men their influential roles in world soccer’s governing body, Swiss prosecutors in November formally accused Blatter of approving an illicit payment of more than $2 million to Platini in 2011.
At the trial, the defendants argued that the money was back payment for services rendered by Platini in his role as a FIFA adviser.
Blatter and Platini said at the trial that they came to a “gentlemen’s agreement” over his pay in 1998, a time when Blatter claimed FIFA could not afford his salary. Platini would sign a contract to work for FIFA in August 1999, with the adviser job paying him around $300,000 annually.
Prosecutors alleged that the “gentlemen’s agreement” never happened and that Platini “submitted to FIFA in 2011 an allegedly fictitious invoice for a debt still existing for his activity as an adviser for FIFA in the years 1998 to 2002.”
But one of the judges said that the agreement seemed credible and that the millions paid by FIFA to Platini in 2011 were appropriate, considering his standing as President of UEFA, European soccer’s governing body.
The payment, which was revealed in a 2015 investigation into bribery, fraud, and money laundering at FIFA by the U.S. Department of Justice, led to Blatter’s downfall after 17 years as FIFA president. The 86-year-old remains banned from the sport and is the subject of a separate Swiss investigation into other alleged illicit payments.
Platini, a former star for the French national team, was in line to replace Blatter before he, too, was barred from the sport for unethical conduct, a ban that ended last year. He has long claimed that the charge was a way to keep him from taking over as FIFA president when Blatter retired.
“Following the decision of the judges of the Court of Bellinzona, this morning, I wanted to express my happiness for all my loved ones that justice has finally been done after seven years of lies and manipulation,” Platini said in a statement. “The truth has come to light during this trial.
“I kept saying it: my fight is a fight against injustice. I won the first game. In this case, there are culprits who did not appear during this trial. Let them count on me, we will meet again. Because I will not give up and I will go all the way in my quest for truth.”
Platini now could run next year for the FIFA presidency in an attempt to topple Gianni Infantino, who replaced Blatter in 2016. Infantino had previously served as UEFA general secretary under Platini for six years. In November, Platini filed a criminal complaint against his former underling in France, accusing Infantino and other FIFA officials of influence-peddling.
“Believe me, going from being a legend of world soccer to a devil is very difficult, especially when it comes to you in a totally unfair way,” Platini said in his statement Friday.
