A Swiss court has rejected a request by South Korean FIFA presidential hopeful Chung Mong-joon to lift a recent ban on him, the world’s football governing body said Tuesday, all but ruling out Chung’s chances of running in next year’s election.
Chung had tried to have his six-year ban lifted temporarily so that he could run in the Feb. 26 election to replace Sepp Blatter as head of the corruption-ridden body. FIFA said the Swiss court found no indication of a defective procedure when FIFA’s Ethics Committee handed down the ban on Oct. 8. Chung can appeal the court decision.
The deadline to register as a candidate, with endorsements from five national federations, is Oct. 26. If the ban isn’t at least temporarily lifted by then, Chung, a FIFA vice president from 1994 to 2011, won’t be able to enter the race.
FIFA’s Ethics Committee earlier banned Chung for six years from all football activities “on a national and international level,” and also fined him 100,000 Swiss francs ($104,640) for violating FIFA rules during South Korea’s bidding for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
Chung had been under scrutiny for writing to FIFA executive members in 2010 about creating the Global Football Fund, valued at $777 million during the bid.
In the aftermath, Chung charged that FIFA was politically driven to mete out punishment against him and that he’d appeal the ruling to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
Another presidential hopeful, UEFA boss Michel Platini, has been suspended for 90 days.
With two of the big names in the early race banned, FIFA’s Executive Committee confirmed Tuesday that the election will take place as scheduled on Feb. 26.
Domenico Scala, chairman of the FIFA Ad-hoc Electoral Committee, said candidacies for FIFA presidency submitted by those under a ban will not be processed. (Yonhap)
