UEFA: Platini has no plans to publicly justify FIFA payment
Michel Platini does not feel the need to publicly justify his £1.35million ($2m) payment from FIFA despite questions being raised about the nine-year delay in receiving the money, according to UEFA's head of communications.
The UEFA president is being investigated by Swiss prosecutors and FIFA's ethics committee over a 2million Swiss franc payment signed off by FIFA president Sepp Blatter in February 2011 apparently for work as technical advisor carried out between 1999 and 2002.
Platini has not publicly explained the reason for such a lengthy delay beyond that when he started his role as Blatter's advisor in 1999 he was told "that it was not initially possible to pay the totality of my salary because of FIFA's financial situation at that time".
The Swiss attorney general has opened criminal proceedings against Blatter regarding the payment. Blatter denies wrongdoing.
Platini says he is still determined to run for the position of FIFA president and has provided all the necessary information to the investigating authorities.
UEFA head of communications Pedro Pinto, speaking in London at the Leaders in Sport business summit, said: "The president (Platini) currently feels that he has given satisfactory explanations to the authorities that are dealing with this case.
"Publicly, he feels there is nothing else to add because he feels he has does nothing wrong and therefore does not need to justify himself publicly at the moment."
Nominations for the FIFA presidency needed to be submitted by October 26 with each candidate nominated by at least five national associations.
Franco Carraro, the Italian who was the former chairman of FIFA's internal audit committee, said he could not recall seeing any paperwork about the payment to Platini and said the nine-year delay was "abnormal".
Carraro told newspaper La Repubblica: "I was the person checking the accounts, but I do not remember seeing an item of expenditure in favour of Platini for his consultancy.
"And the timing of the payment, being nine years late, is objectively abnormal."
