ZURICH: FIFA has handed its former president Sepp Blatter and secretary-general Jérôme Valcke, both of whom are already serving suspensions, additional bans of almost seven years (six years and eight months) from the game and fined them CHF1 million ($1.07 million) each.
The independent ethics committee of world football’s governing body found Blatter and Valcke “guilty of various violations of the FIFA Code of Ethics (FCE)”.
The investigations into Blatter and Valcke covered various charges, in particular concerning bonus payments in relation to FIFA competitions that were paid to top FIFA management officials, various amendments and extensions of employment contracts, as well as reimbursement by FIFA of private legal costs in the case of Valcke.
The decisions were notified to Blatter and Valcke on Wednesday, and have also been published on legal.fifa.com. As the previous bans from taking part in all football-related activity imposed on Blatter and Valcke by the independent ethics committee in 2015 and 2016 have not yet been purged, the bans notified Wednesday will only come into force upon the expiry of the previous bans (i.e. on 8 October 2021 and 8 October 2025, respectively).
