UEFA holds crisis talks on Platini
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UEFA’s crisis talks called to discuss the plight of its suspended president Michel Platini got under way yesterday in Nyon, Switzerland.
The emergency meeting at the headquarters of European football’s ruling body will give Platini a strong indication of the level of support he can count on in his bid to succeed Sepp Blatter as president of FIFA.
The Frenchman was the frontrunner to take control of football’s scandal-tainted governing body until last week’s 90-day suspension ordered by the FIFA ethics committee charged with investigating the corruption scandal engulfing FIFA.
Platini is being investigated over a contentious US$2 million payment made to him by Blatter in 2011 for consultancy work performed years earlier.
The former France and Juventus star is not allowed to attend the meeting of the body’s 54 member unions.
Yesterday’s proceedings began with a meeting of UEFA’s executive committee as Platini’s place at the head of the table was assumed by vice-president Angel Maria Villar Llona of Spain.
Before the talks began a lorry bearing the name of a company called ‘datarec sa’ and advertising it’s services as ‘destruction of confidential documents’ was seen arriving at UEFA’s base before leaving half an hour later.
Top of UEFA’s agenda is “the question of Michel Platini’s suspension and the eventual request to postpone FIFA’s presidential election”, a UEFA source said.
German Football Federation boss Wolfgang Niersbach says the crisis talks will help determine whether or not Platini could maintain his candidature to replace Blatter as FIFA’s head in February’s elections with the corruption investigation hanging over his head.
He is more concerned that Platini’s situation could drag UEFA into the FIFA corruption scandal. “We have to avoid that at all costs. We must protect UEFA,” he told the Die Zeit newspaper.
The 60-year-old Platini denies any wrongdoing and is appealing his ban.
Hours before UEFA’s meeting began Prince Ali bin Hussein, Platini’s main rival to succeed Blatter, formally registered his candidacy for next year’s election to run FIFA. The Jordanian royal’s potential opponents include Brazilian legend Zico, Liberia’s Musa Bility and South African Tokyo Sexwale, an anti-apartheid campaigner.
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