Former FIFA official Valcke gets ethics ban cut by 2 years

ZURICH – FIFA’s former secretary general Jerome Valcke has had his ban from football cut from 12 to 10 years on appeal.

Valcke was fired by FIFA in January over World Cup ticketing and broadcast rights scandal, plus expenses abuses.

Within weeks, he was banned by FIFA’s ethics committee for several charges of misconduct, including claims he destroyed evidence during the investigation.

FIFA said Tuesday its appeals committee ruled that ethics judges were too severe with Valcke over the 2018-2022 World Cup TV rights case.

Valcke can challenge the appeal verdict at the Court of Arbitration for Sport.

The French former TV presenter also remains under criminal investigation by Switzerland’s attorney general’s office. That case was formally opened in March “on suspicion of various acts of criminal mismanagement,” federal prosecutors said then.

Valcke had a partial victory on Tuesday because the FIFA appeals panel judged that “mitigating factors had not been fully assessed” relating to a proposed sale of television rights for the Caribbean for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

FIFA wanted to sell those rights to the control of now-disgraced former vice-president Jack Warner for a “fee far below their actual market value,” FIFA said.