AFC extend Bin Hammam suspension

Published August 19, 2012

Bin Hammam has denied both charges levelled against him. -Photo by AFP

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) have extended the provisional suspension of their former president Mohamed bin Hammam by 20 days, the governing body said on Sunday, as investigations into allegations of financial wrongdoing continue.

The Qatari had been initially suspended for 30 days but chairman of the AFC Disciplinary Committee, Lim Kia Tong, extended that on Wednesday, a day before the ban was due to expire, a statement from the AFC said.

Bin Hammam is also facing a new investigation by football's world governing body FIFA, who handed the Qatari a lifetime ban for bribery only to see that ruling overturned by sport's highest court CAS last month.

Bin Hammam has denied both charges levelled against him and said on Tuesday he would shortly announce further steps to challenge 'this clear abuse of power and process at the hand of FIFA'.

The 63-year-old Qatari was voted in for a third and final four year term as the head of Asian soccer in January last year before revealing a manifesto to challenge for the FIFA presidency against incumbent Sepp Blatter months later.

But Bin Hammam withdrew his candidacy and was then provisionally suspended, days before the June election over allegations that he had tried to buy the votes of Caribbean officials by handing them $40,000 each in brown envelopes at a meeting in Port of Spain.

Blatter was subsequently re-elected unopposed for a fourth term as FIFA president, while Bin Hammam was found guilty of breaking FIFA's ethics code, including one on bribery, and has been fighting the charges ever since.

Opinion

Editorial

Digital growth
25 Apr, 2024

Digital growth

TECHNOLOGY divides us. According to a new UNDP report on Pakistan, titled Doing Digital for Development — Access,...
Nikah rights
25 Apr, 2024

Nikah rights

THE Supreme Court recently delivered a judgement championing the rights of women within a marriage. The ruling...
Campus crackdowns
25 Apr, 2024

Campus crackdowns

WHILE most Western governments have either been gladly facilitating Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza, or meekly...
Ties with Tehran
Updated 24 Apr, 2024

Ties with Tehran

Tomorrow, if ties between Washington and Beijing nosedive, and the US asks Pakistan to reconsider CPEC, will we comply?
Working together
24 Apr, 2024

Working together

PAKISTAN’S democracy seems adrift, and no one understands this better than our politicians. The system has gone...
Farmers’ anxiety
24 Apr, 2024

Farmers’ anxiety

WHEAT prices in Punjab have plummeted far below the minimum support price owing to a bumper harvest, reckless...