Temarii and Adamu appeal FIFA bans
Reuters - Thursday 13 January 2011, 16:40
ZURICH - Two FIFA executive committee
members have formally appealed against suspensions imposed on
them last year over allegations they offered to sell their votes
in the contest to host the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
"Both have appealed formally and the appeals committee will
look at it at a date to be confirmed," a FIFA spokesman said.
FIFA's 24-man executive committee was two men short when it
chose Russia to host the 2018 World Cup in December and Qatar
for 2022 following the bans on Amos Adamu and Reynald Temarii.
Adamu of Nigeria was banned from all football-related
activities for three years and fined 10,000 Swiss francs
for breaches of five articles of FIFA's ethics code
including one on bribery.
Tahiti's Reynald Temarii, president of the Oceania Football
Confederation (OFC), was found guilty by FIFA's ethics committee
in November of breaching ethics guidelines, banned for one year
and fined 5,000 Swiss francs.
The decisions, following allegations by Britain's Sunday
Times newspaper that the pair offered to sell their votes to
undercover reporters posing as lobbyists for an American
consortium, were taken by FIFA's ethics committee in November.
Four other officials were also banned and fined in an
unprecedented move by soccer's world governing body.
The case cast a cloud over the bidding process, which was
further confused by the decision to choose the hosts of two
World Cup tournaments at the same time.
The OFC is due to meet in American Samoa on Saturday to
elect Temarii's replacement.
FIFA's appeals committee is headed by Bermuda's Larry
Mussenden. Temarii and Adamu have a further right of appeal to
the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).