Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter and former UEFA president Michel Platini have been cleared of financial wrongdoing by an appeals court in Switzerland.
The case related to a payment of two million Swiss francs (now £1.7m; $2.7m) from FIFA, while Blatter was president, to Platini in 2011. Blatter, 89, and Platini, 69, had been facing a charge of corruption at the Extraordinary Appeals Chamber of the Swiss Criminal Court before being cleared, according to a statement to The Athletic from their lawyer, having previously been cleared of fraud more than two years ago.
Blatter and Platini were initially cleared at the Federal Criminal Court in Bellinzona, Switzerland, in July 2022 after an 11-day trial. The Swiss authorities had charged the pair with fraud, mismanagement, misappropriation of FIFA funds and forgery of a document in November 2021, six and a half years after beginning an investigation into them.
In December 2015, Blatter and Platini were banned from football for eight years (later reduced to six on appeal) by FIFA after an investigation by its ethics committee. FIFA, and the Swiss authorities, alleged that the two million Swiss francs payment was to ensure Platini helped deliver the requisite votes to ensure Blatter was re-elected as FIFA president in 2011.
Blatter and Platini have always denied wrongdoing and said the payment was a fee paid to the former for work he did as an advisor from 1998 to 2002, which was delayed as FIFA lacked the funds to pay him in full at the time.
“After two acquittals, even the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland must realize that these criminal proceedings have definitively failed. Michel Platini must finally be left in peace in criminal matters,” lawyer Dominic Nellen said in a statement on Tuesday.
“The criminal proceedings have had not only legal but also massive personal and professional consequences for Michel Platini — although no incriminating evidence was ever presented. Among other things, the criminal proceedings prevented his election as FIFA president in 2016.”
The defense team had requested that FIFA be excluded from the appeal proceedings, adding that the organisation did not appear at the latest hearing, which the defense said was “a clear sign that it too had lost interest in these criminal proceedings following the 2022 acquittal.”
Nellen added: “Michel Platini is relieved about the renewed acquittal. He has always emphasized that the payment was a back payment of wages. This has now been confirmed by the courts for a second time.”
“The Office of the Attorney General has not managed to find a single piece of incriminating evidence for over ten years. These proceedings were not justified and should never have been conducted.
“After the failure of the criminal proceedings, the defense will now analyze how to take legal action against those responsible for the criminal proceedings.”
Platini outside the court on Tuesday (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)
Blatter became FIFA president in 1998. His reign as the most powerful figure in football was not without controversies, with several corruption scandals hitting FIFA and the awarding of the 2018 and 2022 men’s World Cups to Russia and Qatar respectively attracting widespread criticism. Blatter admitted in 2022 that awarding that year’s tournament to Qatar 12 years earlier had been “a mistake”.
Platini took over at UEFA in 2007. The former midfielder had featured for Nancy, Saint-Etienne and Juventus during a 15-year playing career between 1972 and 1987, winning the European Championship with France in 1984.
Platini had been widely tipped to take over as FIFA president from Blatter before the pair were banned from football in 2015. In February 2016, Gianni Infantino was elected as Blatter’s successor and has remained in the role since.
(Top image of Blatter: Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)
