Overview
- Michel Platini has lodged a formal criminal complaint that names FIFA president Gianni Infantino and former officials Marco Villiger and Domenico Scala for calumny and influence‑peddling and includes a constitution de partie civile intended to attach his civil claims to a criminal probe.
- He has also launched a separate civil liability action against FIFA seeking compensation for harms he says resulted from manoeuvres that prevented his 2015 bid for the presidency of world football.
- The case rests on the 2011 payment of 2 million Swiss francs to Platini, a disclosure in 2015 that led to disciplinary and criminal steps which sidelined him and helped clear the way for Infantino’s 2016 election; Platini was definitively acquitted in Switzerland in August 2025.
- Platini previously filed simpler complaints in 2018 and 2021 that were declared time‑barred or closed without further action, and he says the new formal filing is a clear escalation aimed at securing a full judicial inquiry.
- If an investigating judge is appointed, Swiss authorities could open formal evidence‑gathering including witness interviews and document seizure, a development that could intensify scrutiny of FIFA governance and affect Infantino’s bid for another term.