FIFA opens ethics case against Nigeria’sAmos Adamu

FIFA’s Ethics Committee has opened proceedings against Nigeria’s Amos Adamu for an ethics violation, the world football governing body said on Tuesday.

Adamu has already served a three-year ban from all football-related activities for accepting bribes in relation to the attribution of the 2018 World Cup to Russia and 2022 tournament to Qatar. He now faces another two-year suspension and 20,000 Swiss franc fine ($19,445, 18,724 euros) for further ethics violations, a FIFA statement said. An investigation into Adamu, a former FIFA executive committee member and West African Football Union president, was opened on March 9, 2015.

A final report was passed to FIFA’s adjudicatory chamber earlier this month recommending a sanction, after which ethics committee chairman Hans-Joachim Eckert decided to open proceedings. FIFA said it would make no further comment on the case “for reasons linked to privacy rights and the presumption of innocence until proven guilty”. World football’s governing body has been in turmoil since last year due to a number of corruption scandals, including that of a two million Swiss franc payment made by former president Sepp Blatter to ex-UEFA supremo Michel Platini that saw both men banned from the game.