Bin Hammam calls for probe to include Blatter

Mohamed Bin Hammam has demanded Sepp Blatter also be scrutinised by an ethics investigation that threatens to derail his election campaign.

Bin Hammam, who is campaigning to replace Blatter as FIFA president in an election scheduled for Tuesday, will face a hearing on Sunday over bombshell allegations he offered bribes to delegates in return for their votes.

He and CONCACAF head Jack Warner have been accused of offering members of the Caribbean Football Union US$40,000 for development projects, with the clear implication that the money was in return for their support of the Asian Football Confederation chief.

In a statement on his official website, Bin Hammam said he was happy to appear before the ethics committee but requested Blatter should also be asked to attend, claiming the FIFA president was not only aware of the payments but condoned them.

“The timing of the accusations so close to the election of the FIFA president suggests that they are part of a plan to damage Mr Bin Hammam and force him to withdraw as a candidate for the FIFA presidency,” the statement read.

“The accusations also contain statements according to which Mr Blatter … was informed of, but did not oppose, payments allegedly made to members of the Caribbean Football Union.”

“Mr Bin Hammam has therefore requested that the investigation by the ethics committee be extended to include Mr Blatter himself.”

Blatter, seeking a fourth consecutive term as FIFA president, denied he had orchestrated a smear campaign and expressing ‘shock and dismay’ at the allegations levelled against his rival.

“I am shocked, saddened and deeply unhappy about the charges levelled against a man whose friendship I enjoyed for many years,” Blatter said in his column for Inside World Football.

“It gives me no pleasure to see him suffer public disgrace before an investigation would even have started.”

“I take no joy to see men who stood by my side for some two decades, suffer through public humiliation without having been convicted of any wrongdoing.”

“(But) to now assume that the present ordeal of my opponent were to fill me with some sort of perverse satisfaction or that this entire matter was somehow masterminded by me is ludicrous and completely reprehensible.”

“No sane person can take pleasure in this development, and no decent person will enjoy the troubles of others, be that friend or foe.”