AFP/London

FIFA presidential candidate Chung Mong-Joon said yesterday he plans to start legal action against world football leader Sepp Blatter who he slammed as “a hypocrite and a liar.”
Chung, who says he faces suspension by FIFA’s independent ethics committee, condemned Blatter for refusing to divulge his salary and “secretive” management.
“That is why I plan to sue Mr Blatter for embezzlement,” Chung told the Sport Leaders convention in London.
He said Blatter had “repeatedly meddled” in the elections of major football confederations that make up FIFA.
“In short Mr Blatter is a hypocrite and a liar.”
The South Korean billionaire said that when he was a FIFA vice president he “took pride” in wearing the blazer of football’s world body.
“Now I will be laughed at or be attacked. FIFA has become a badge of shame. I will make it a badge of pride” if elected, he said.
Chung, who announced Tuesday that he faces a 19 year ban from football activities, is one of three leading candidates to be FIFA president in an election in February.
UEFA president Michel Platini and Prince Ali bin al-Hussein are also standing.
French football legend Platini, however, has also been dragged into the storm engulfing FIFA over a $2million payment he received from the organisation in 2011 for consulting work done between 1998 and 2002.
Chung said on Tuesday that FIFA’s independent ethics committee had asked for him to be handed a 15 year suspension from all football activities for alleged vote-trading and other actions during bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup.
South Korea was one of the candidates for the 2022 World Cup which went to Qatar.
Chung added that he faced an additional four year ban for allegedly defaming the ethics committee.
FIFA and its ethics commission have so far declined to comment on the South Korean’s claims.
Blatter, meanwhile, has made it clear he will not resign as FIFA president and is determined to fight right up until the next election on February 26.
“I will only stop (working) on February 26 and not a day before,” Blatter told German magazine Bunte, which is due out on Thursday.
“I will fight until February 26. For me. And for FIFA. I am convinced that evil will come into the light and good will triumph.”
Having been re-elected as FIFA president in May, Blatter announced in June that he was calling a fresh election for February 2016 because he did not feel he had “a mandate from the entire world of football.”
His sudden about-turn followed a police swoop in May on FIFA officials in a Zurich hotel ahead of the organisation’s annual general meeting.  
The US Justice Department subsequently indicted 14 people, including nine FIFA officials over bribery in football and deals worth more than $150 million dating back to 1991.
Blatter denies any wrongdoing, but Swiss prosecutors say he is the target of a probe into “criminal mismanagement” at FIFA.