They were once the two most powerful men in global football, until being banned by Fifa’s ethics committee in 2015 over a secret payment of two million Swiss francs (£1.65m at the current exchange rate). Now, after a seven-year investigation, that same payment will lead to Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini finally stepping into the Swiss federal criminal court this week, facing fraud, embezzlement and other corruption charges.
The 86-year-old Blatter, who has been battling ill-health, is due on the stand on day one of the two-week trial, which starts in Bellinzona on Wednesday. Platini will be interrogated on Friday. The trial, which will be before a panel of three judges, will conclude on 22 June, with a verdict on 8 July.
It will certainly make for electric theatre. But the stakes in football’s trial of the century could not be higher for Blatter or Platini. If found guilty they could face a five-year prison sentence as well as a substantial fine.
At the heart of the case is the infamous two million Swiss francs “disloyal” payment to Platini for consultancy services that was authorised by Blatter in January 2011, which ended up finishing both men’s careers in football. That payment, Swiss prosecutors allege, “was made without a legal basis” and “unlawfully enriched Platini”.
Documents posted by the court provide further details to the prosecutors’ case. “Joseph S Blatter and Michel François Platini are accused of illegally obtaining a payment of CHF 2m to the detriment of Fifa and social security contributions of CHF 229,126 in favour of Platini,” they state. “Among other things, Platini submitted a presumably fictitious invoice to Fifa in 2011 for an [allegedly] still existing claim for his consulting work for Fifa between 1998 and 2002. After the invoice had been signed and Blatter had confirmed the existence of the claim, Fifa settled the corresponding claim [including social security contributions] in favour of Platini.”
Blatter, who is accused of fraud, embezzlement, unfaithful business management and forging a document, denies the charges. As does Platini, who has been charged with fraud, accomplice to embezzlement, misappropriation and as an accomplice to Blatter’s alleged mismanagement.
Blatter said in a statement: “I view the proceedings at the federal criminal court with optimism – and hope that, with this, this story will come to an end and all the facts will be worked through cleanly.”
In his statement Platini, a three-time Ballon d’Or winner who guided France to the European Championship in 1984, said: “I fully contest these unfounded and unfair accusations.”
Both men claim that they had a verbal agreement for the money to be paid as a backdated additional salary for Platini, who worked as a special adviser in Blatter’s first term, from 1998-2002. However, Swiss law places a five-year time limit on such payments.
Platini has also claimed Blatter told him at the time that Fifa could not afford to pay him, despite the governing body having a total income of 2.7bn Swiss francs and an overall profit of 115m Swiss francs over the period.
The payment also came as Blatter – who had fallen out with his former protege in 2008 – was preparing to campaign for re-election as Fifa president against Mohamed bin Hammam of Qatar, where Platini’s influence with European voters was seen as a crucial factor. Platini had been expected to stand in that election but in the end did not run for office.
The trial is the culmination of a case that began in 2015 when Swiss prosecutors opened criminal proceedings against Blatter before a police raid at Fifa headquarters in Zurich.
That led to Blatter stepping down as Fifa president just days after winning a record fifth election and ended Platini’s campaign to succeed his former mentor. They were later suspended and banned from football by Fifa’s ethics committee.
While a wider investigation by authorities in the United States led to numerous Fifa executives being arrested and convicted on charges that included racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering, this is the first time Blatter or Platini have faced criminal charges.
However Blatter, who had a serious bout of ill-health after undergoing heart surgery in December 2020, also faces a separate criminal proceeding related to authorising a $1m Fifa payment to Trinidad & Tobago in 2010 into the control of the then Fifa vice-president, Jack Warner. Two former Fifa officials are also suspects in that investigation.
Blatter remains banned from football. Last year the adjudicatory chamber of Fifa’s ethics committee extended his ban to 2027 after finding him in breach of rules concerning duty of loyalty, conflicts of interest and offering or accepting gifts or other benefits. They called his behaviour “completely reprehensible”.
Platini, meanwhile, has not yet returned to football after his four-year ban ended in 2019 as he has fought to clear his name. He maintains that he is the victim of a plot to deny him the Fifa presidency and that he paid taxes on the two million Swiss francs payment after receiving it.
He has accused Swiss prosecutors of colluding with Fifa’s current president, Gianni Infantino, and of a “relentlessness to want to unduly implicate me in a case in which my entire good faith had been recognised”. As his lawyer, Dominic Nellen, put it: “We are confident that the outcome of the trial will establish the perfect good faith of Mr Michel Platini in this affair, which has been fabricated to remove him from the presidency of Fifa.”
Those arguments will be played out in a dramatic 11 days of a trial that promises to be one of the most high profile in football politics’ long and often sordid history.
