Havelange resigns over bribes report

Joao Havelange, the Brazilian who ruled Fifa for more than two decades, has resigned as honorary president of the world governing body after being named as having received bribes.

The long-awaited reported by Fifa’s ethics committee into the scandal involving collapsed marketing partners ISL has named Havelange and two former executive committee members, Ricardo Teixeira and Nicolas Leoz, as receiving bribes. All three have since resigned from FIFA.

The report by Fifa Adjudicatory Chamber chairman Hans-Joachim Eckert also calls current FIFA president Sepp Blatter’s handling of the scandal “clumsy” but says it did not breach ethics rules.

Blatter welcoming he had been cleared of misconduct.

He said: “I also note with satisfaction that this report confirms that president Blatter’s conduct could not be classified in any way as misconduct with regard to any ethics rules’.

“I have no doubt Fifa, thanks to the governance reform process I proposed, now has the mechanisms and means to ensure such an issue — which has caused untold damage to the reputation of our institution — does not happen again.”