A United States court has granted a two-week extension of the deadline given to the world football body, FIFA, to respond to Samson Siasia’s suit challenging his coach licence ban and indictment for bribery.
UPHORIALMEDIA reported that Siasia, who holds dual citizenship in Nigeria and the U.S., filed his suit on August 2, 2021, seeking nullification of both FIFA’s decision and the subsequent review reducing the sanctions.
On August 5, the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, issued a summons to FIFA with a 21-day ultimatum to file its answer to the suit.
The 21-day ultimatum, which started counting from August 31 when FIFA was served Mr Siasia’s suit, was due on September 21.
But the court’s records exclusively obtained by this newspaper on Tuesday shows the judge, Alvin Hellerstein, has extended the deadline by two weeks, following an application by FIFA’s lawyers.
Mr Hellerstein rejected Mr Siasia’s objection to FIFA’s request to set a new deadline of October 5.
“The extension is granted. So ordered,” the judge ruled on September 2.
Siasia, a former Super Eagles coach, who had also handled other Nigeria’s national football teams, was convicted by FIFA in 2019 for agreeing to an offer of a coaching job with a match-fixing clause, although the contract failed to sail through negotiations.
The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) in its verdict handed down on August 16, 2019, placed a life ban on his coach licence and awarded a monetary fine of 50,000 Swiss Francs against him.
Following his appeal against the decision, a Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) panel, in its decision handed down on June 21, 2021, reduced the lifetime ban on his coach licence to five years, and dismissed the monetary fine.
The CAS panel partially upheld the guilty verdict as it faulted some fundamental aspects of FIFA’s verdict.
It, for instance, described the lifetime ban with the monetary fine of 50,000 Swiss Francs imposed on Siasia by FIFA, as a cruel and unusual punishment.
The punishment was disproportionate to the alleged offence, the panel added.
Still dissatisfied with the CAS panel’s decision, Siasia filed his suit at the U.S. court seeking an annulment of “the lifetime or any ban” on his coach licence.
He said he was not aware of the bribery charge investigated by FIFA until the verdict imposing a life ban on him was published on August 16, 2019, a claim the CAS agreed to in its review of FIFA’s verdict.
