Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini cleared of corruption charges by Swiss court

Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter and French football legend Michel Platini were cleared of corruption charges by a Swiss court on Tuesday.

The two most powerful figures in global football were acquitted of fraud by the Extraordinary Appeals Chamber of the Swiss Criminal Court, located in Muttenz, near Basel.

The ruling came after Swiss federal prosecutors appealed their 2022 acquittal in a lower court. Both Blatter and Platini had consistently denied the charges of fraud.

“After two acquittals, even the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland must realise that these criminal proceedings have definitively failed. Michel Platini must finally be left in peace in criminal matters,” Platini’s lawyer Dominic Nellen said in a statement.

The case revolves around a payment of 2 million Swiss francs ($2.26million) that Sepp Blatter authorised for Michel Platini, a former captain, and manager of the French national team, in 2011.

The payment was a consultancy fee for work Platini carried out between 1998 and 2002. According to the Frenchman, part of the payment had been deferred due to FIFA’s financial constraints at the time.

The scandal surfaced in 2015 while Platini was serving as president of UEFA, European football’s governing body. The controversy ultimately derailed his ambitions of succeeding Blatter, who was forced out of FIFA as a result of the affair.

“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,” Nellen said.

The latest victory for Blatter and the 69-year-old Platini came exactly nine and a half years after a Swiss federal investigation, which began in September 2015, set in motion events that ultimately ended the careers of football’s most powerful figures.