The Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS) has reduced Samson Siasia’s life ban from football to 5 years.
The Former Super Eagles coach was banned by FIFA in August 2019 for allegedly manipulating a football match for the purpose of betting.
He was banned for life and fined $50,000.
After an appeal to CAS on the ground of not being guilty of the offence, the court has reduced his fine and waived the $50,000 fine.
According to the court, “the imposition of a life ban to be disproportionate for a first offence which was committed passively and which had not had an adverse or immediate effect on football stakeholders, and that a five-year ban would still achieve the envisaged aim of punishing the infringement committed by Mr Siasia.”
Also, the reason for waiving the fine was because it would be “excessive to impose a financial sanction in addition to the five-year ban, since the ban sanction already incorporated a financial punishment in eliminating football as a source of revenue for Mr Siasia.
“And considering that Mr Siasia had not obtained any gain or pecuniary benefit from his unethical behaviour.”
In the same vein, the ban was also backdated to start from August 16, 2019.
