Michele Platini: holds tight to Brazil’s gift of luxury watch

UEFA President Michel Platini has stated he will not heed a FIFA directive to return a luxury watch handed to him, as well as other association heads, by the Brazilian Football Confederation in June.

The Ethics Committee of FIFA had asked for the luxury watches, given out by a World Cup sponsor to 32 association heads, 28 FIFA executive committee members and five other members of South American associations, to be returned by all beneficiaries as the gifts broke a code of ethics.

According to the committee, “The CBF should not have offered the watches, and those who received gift bags should have promptly checked whether the items inside were appropriate and, upon discovering the watch, either returned it or reported the matter.”

A number of officials did report the wristwatches to the ethics committee, while English Football Association chairman Greg Dyke as well as FIFA vice-president Jim Boyce have since said they will return the commemorative gifts.

Platini however stated “If the [FIFA] ethics committee was not pleased, they should have told us that four months ago in Brazil, when we received the watches.”

The 59-year old Frenchman added “I’m going to ask for the value of this watch and I’m going to give to a charitable organisation, a foundation, this value. But I can’t return a gift. In my upbringing, I cannot return gifts like that.”

The luxury wristwatches have been valued at £16,400 each by the FIFA ethics committee, contrary to an earlier £5,336 valuation by the Brazil Football Confederation.