BASEL: Sepp Blatter says it was “not acceptable” to be accused at a public event Friday that he stayed silent while likely knowing that senior FIFA officials were corrupt.

“I am not guilty,” the visibly angry former FIFA president later told reporters at the University of Basel in his native Switzerland.

Blatter had been the key speaker in a two-hour debate with a mostly student audience on problems facing world football’s scandal-hit governing body. Two protesters briefly disturbed the event with an anti-FIFA banner, chants and a whistle.

After Blatter again blamed officials in the North and South American soccer bodies for corruption, the session closed with the claim made by former International Criminal Court prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo.

Ocampo suggested Blatter had known about bribery which US federal prosecutors revealed last May in a sprawling indictment that rocked FIFA in its presidential election week.

“The real problem with Mr. Blatter is that he had nothing to do with CONCACAF and CONMEBOL, but he knew,” said Ocampo, once a candidate to be FIFA’s lead ethics investigator.

Ocampo, now a Harvard University professor, said Blatter was supposed to be an example for world football.

“The problem is his silence,” the Argentine lawyer told the audience of about 400 people. “As president of FIFA, he had to be an example. Even if he was not involved, why was he silent?”

Ocampo also said Blatter likely knew — and said nothing — about misconduct implicating long-time FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke, who has denied any wrongdoing.

Blatter’s right-hand man since 2007 was fired by FIFA in January, banned for 12 years by the ethics committee and is the subject of criminal proceedings opened last month by Switzerland’s attorney general.

When Ocampo finished the closing remarks, Blatter joined in applause and reached out to shake hands as his critic walked by.

Minutes later backstage, however, Blatter said he was “very unhappy” with the accusation by Ocampo.

“It is not acceptable. It is not acceptable,” Blatter told reporters. “I was very surprised at Mr. Ocampo invited here for this seminar and then to make such an accusation. Perhaps he is a little bit disappointed because he was the first candidate to be the chair of the ethics committee.”

In 2012, Ocampo was proposed to be FIFA’s first ethics prosecutor by a FIFA advisory group led by Swiss law professor Mark Pieth, who organized Friday’s event.

Ocampo’s appointment was blocked, reportedly due to the influence of then-FIFA senior vice president Julio Grondona of Argentina, who died in 2014 and has since been linked to the bribery conspiracy.

Instead, FIFA picked Michael Garcia, the former US Attorney for the Southern District of New York.

Blatter was forced out after more than 17 years as FIFA president by the international bribery scandal.

He announced his resignation plans last June, days after the US Department of Justice unsealed an indictment alleging a bribery and money laundering conspiracy implicating international football leaders including several FIFA executive committee members.

“I am not responsible morally [for] what the others have done,” said Blatter. “Those things they did within their confederations. I don’t have any power to intervene in their confederations.”

Blatter, with suspended European football chief Michel Platini, was banned from all football activities for eight years in December over an infamous two million Swiss franc ($2 million, 1.8 million euro) payment Platini received in 2011 from the then-FIFA president.

The suspensions were cut to six years in February.

Blatter, since replaced as FIFA president by Gianni Infantino, is awaiting a date for an appeal against his ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).

Platini was told earlier on Friday his CAS appeal will be heard on April 29.

Blatter commented: “It’s good news that CAS has made progress with Platini’s case. I think my case will be handled shortly after.”

The 80-year-old added: “I believe that now, finally, at CAS, they are going to talk about justice, and not just speculation. That means it’s justice that will prove if the accused is guilty and not the accused who has to prove his innocence.”

Published in Dawn, April 17th, 2016