Published on :
Lausanne (AFP) – The appeal trial of Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, boss of beIN Media and Paris SG, in a TV rights case also involving ex-FIFA number 2 Jérôme Valcke, will be held from March 7 to 10 in Switzerland, according to Federal Supreme Court documents.
The federal prosecutor’s office announced in mid-February 2021 that it would appeal the Bellinzona Federal Court’s ruling in late October 2020, which was a clear defeat for the prosecution.
Mr. Al-Khelaïfi had been acquitted, while Jérôme Valcke received a light sentence accompanied by the payment of 1.65 million euros in civil.
MM. Al-Khelaïfi and Valcke were accused of having concluded a pact behind Fifa’s back, falling under “unfair management” and liable to five years in prison.
At the end of ten days of hearing in September 2020, the prosecution had requested 28 months imprisonment once morest the Qatari leader, 3 years once morest Jérôme Valcke and 30 months once morest a Greek businessman, Dinos Deris, acquitted of the head of ” private corruption “in a separate case.
Like the prosecution, the Federal Criminal Court had estimated that Mr. Valcke had cashed his support for beIN in exchange for a luxurious villa on the Sardinian Emerald Coast, bought for him 5 million euros at the end of 2013 by a company briefly owned by Nasser Al-Khelaïfi.
The former secretary general of Fifa had requested the assistance of the Qatari leader to finance the “Villa Bianca”, a few months before the signing in April 2014 of a contract between beIN and the football body on rights in Africa North and Middle East of the 2026 and 2030 Worlds.
In their civil judgment, the magistrates had even qualified as a “bribe” the deposit for the residence reimbursed by Nasser Al-Khelaïfi to Jérôme Valcke. They therefore ordered the latter to reimburse Fifa.
But in criminal matters, the court might not convict for “private corruption”, Fifa having withdrawn its complaint following an agreement with Mr. Al-Khelaïfi, on terms never disclosed.
As for the accusation of “unfair management”, according to the judges, nothing indicates that the fifa might have obtained better than the 480 million dollars for two World Cups, promised by beIN.
In a separate file, Jérôme Valcke was accused of having received 1.25 million euros from Dinos Deris, to promote the obtaining of media rights for several World Cups in Greece and Italy: he has once more was cleared of the main charge, but convicted of having recorded these bribes under the term “loans” in his accounts.
© 2022 AFP
