FIFA has banned Wolfgang Niersbach from football for one year. This came after the Committee found that Niersbach had failed to report possible wrongdoing related to the awarding of the 2006 World Cup to Germany. The adjudicatory chamber of the independent Ethics Committee announced the one-year ban on the former president of the German FA (DFB), Wolfgang Niersbach, in a statement posted on FIFA's website on Monday. It said that it had banned Niersbach, who was the vice president of the 2006 World Cup Organizing Committee, from all football related activities with immediate effect. The adjudicatory chamber said it had found that Niersbach had "failed to report findings about possible misconduct concerning the awarding of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, including potential breaches of the FIFA Code of Ethics." The statement said that the investigation had not looked into possible breaches of the Code of Ethics with respect to "possible acts of bribery and/or corruption with regards to the award of the 2006 FIFA World Cup, but only evaluated Mr Niersbach's awareness of the said incidents and his failure to report them to the Ethics Committee in a timely manner." The adjudicatory chamber handed down the ruling on the basis of a probe launched by the investigatory chamber back in May.# Loss of FIFA and UEFA posts The ban means that Niersbach, who resigned as DFB president last November amid a scandal over the awarding of the right to host the 2006 World Cup to Germany, loses his seats on the FIFA Council and the UEFA Executive Committee. Reacting to the news shortly after it was made public, Niersbach said he regarded the ban as "disproportionate and excessive" and that he would consider whether to take legal action against it. pfd/apc (SID, dpa)
