French prosecutors hand Platini case over to Bern

French football legend Platini served as president of UEFA until 2015. Keystone / Walter Bieri

A complaint brought by Michel Platini in November 2021 against Gianni Infantino, head of world football's governing body FIFA, for influence peddling has been transferred to the Swiss justice system.

The public prosecutor’s office in Paris confirmed the step to the AFP news agency on Wednesday. After examination, Platini’s complaint “was the object of an official denunciation lodged with Swiss justice authorities”, it said.

Platini said in a press statement that the decision was “outrageous”.

“I know that Switzerland is not going to look into this: my first complaint filed in Switzerland was shelved without a single investigation taking place, and on absurd grounds,” he wrote.

Platini added that his complaint was about finding those responsible for a “plot” which led to him being charged of fraud – along with former FIFA boss Sepp Blatter – by Swiss justice authorities. Both were cleared of these charges in July 2022.

+ From July 2022: Swiss court throws out Platini and Blatter charges

The complaint in question also targets Marco Villiger, the former legal director and deputy secretary general of Zurich-based FIFA, Platini said.

The former football star has been opposed for some years to Infantino and his entourage, whom he suspects of having ousted him from the race for the FIFA presidency in 2015 by alerting Swiss prosecutors to a suspicious 2011 payment of CHF2 million ($2.32 million). The payment was made by FIFA on the orders of then president Sepp Blatter, without written justification.

Platini’s lawyer said on Wednesday that the offence of influence peddling “does not exist in Swiss law”, and that the decision to send Platini’s complaint to Bern was “legally incomprehensible and morally confusing”.