Mohamed Bin Hammam, the Asian soccer chief who was due to challenge Sepp Blatter for the FIFA presidency last month, was banned for life by football's ruling body Saturday for his part in a cash-for-votes scandal. The 62-year-old Qatari, who has been on FIFA's executive committee since 1996, vowed to appeal against the suspension. He said he was innocent and the case against him was built upon “lies by senior FIFA officials”. A FIFA ethics committee launched an investigation following allegations that Bin Hammam, a multi-millionaire businessman, had tried to buy the votes of Caribbean Football Union (CFU)officials ahead of the presidential election on June 1. After a two-day hearing at FIFA headquarters Bin Hammam was found to have broken seven articles of the organization's ethics code including one on bribery, acting head of the committee Petrus Damaseb told reporters. Former CONCACAF president Jack Warner, a major FIFA powerbroker, resigned in June after he was also accused of wrongdoing at the same meeting in Port of Spain, Trinidad, on May 10-11, the latest scandal to hit soccer's beleaguered governing body. Like Bin Hammam, Warner was provisionally banned pending the ethics committee investigation into allegations that Caribbean officials were handed $40,000 each in brown envelopes as a sweetener. Bin Hammam, Asian Football Confederation (AFC) president since 2002, pulled out of the FIFA presidential race on May 29, leaving Blatter to be re-elected unopposed for a fourth term three days later. Damaseb also said two CFU officials, Debbie Minguell and Jason Sylvester, would be banned for one year and recommended further investigations “into conduct of others who attended the meeting of May 10-11”. Chuck Blazer, the FIFA executive committee member whose report led to the ethics committee probe, was warned for comments he made at a CONCACAF (Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football) meeting in Zurich on May 30. None of the four accused attended the two-day hearing in Zurich but Bin Hammam was represented by his lawyers. Blatter was in Argentina, for Sunday's Copa America final between Uruguay and Paraguay, when the life ban was announced. Qatar is to host the 2022 World Cup and Bin Hammam's compatriots said his legacy would live on. “It's sad for all of Qatar, not just Mohamed,” said Mohammed Johar, 50, head of logistics for the Al
