FIFA bans ExCo member Fernando for 90 days
Reuters - Monday 11 March 2013, 14:31
President Sepp Blatter's push to clean up FIFA flushed out another
potentially corrupt official on Monday when executive committee member
Vernon Manilal Fernando of Sri Lanka was banned from any football
activity for three months.
A
source close to FIFA said the 63-year-old - a member of the executive
since 2011 - was banned while Michael Garcia, the chairman of the
investigatory chamber of the ethics committee, examines an alleged
misuse of Asian Football Confederation (AFC) funds.
Fernando
was a close ally of former FIFA executive committee member and AFC
president Mohamed Bin Hammam, who was banned from football for life by
FIFA following his involvement in the 2011 bribery scandal when he was
standing against Blatter for president.
Bin
Hammam was due to stand against Blatter in the election but pulled out
after it was alleged he tried to bribe Caribbean delegates.
Fernando accompanied Bin Hammam on his ill-fated trip to Trinidad which precipitated the Qatari's downfall.
Despite
his initial ban being annulled by the Court of Arbitration for Sport,
Bin Hammam resigned from all his football-related responsibilities in
December after being charged with repeated violations while president of
the AFC.
He was again banned for life by FIFA.
Fernando
lists his profession as an attorney at law on FIFA's executive
committee web page, says his hobby is "playing the stock market" and
states his fondest footballing memories are meeting Pele and "being
elected at FIFA".
DIFFICULT PERIOD
However,
his ban means he will not take part in the next FIFA executive
committee meeting next week and cannot play any part in the political
manoeuvring that is building ahead of the Asian Football Confederation
(AFC) presidential elections in Kuala Lumpur on May 2.
Those
elections will end a difficult period in the governance of Asian football with a permanent successor to Bin Hammam finally appointed.
Blatter,
who has vigorously denied media accusations regarding his own probity
over the last few years, approved the establishment of an independent
investigation into world football's governing body with the aim of ridding
it of dishonest officials and the suspicion that the body was corrupt.
Nigerian
Amos Adamu and Reynald Temarii of Tahiti, at the time the president of
the Oceania confederation, were banned for their part in a
cash-for-votes scandal involving voting for the World Cup after being
trapped by an undercover investigation by the Sunday Times newspaper in
London.
In the recent past a
number of high profile officials have left the executive committee,
including Jack Warner of Trinidad & Tobago, Bin Hammam, Ricardo
Teixeira of Brazil and Chuck Blazer of the United States.
Although
FIFA will not confirm why Fernando has been suspended, there are
currently at least three on-going investigations being undertaken into
FIFA, under the general umbrella of the Independent Governance Committee
headed by Swiss lawyer Mark Pieth.
In
its statement, FIFA said the decision to ban Fernando was taken "based
on Article 83, Paragraph One of the FIFA Code of Ethics, in order to
prevent interference with the establishment of the truth with respect to
proceedings now in the adjudicatory chamber".