Report: Sepp Blatter Rejects UEFA’s Calls To Resign As FIFA President

Sepp Blatter won’t go away on his own free will, despite pleas from other powerful forces in the soccer world.

Blatter refused a request from UEFA president Michele Platini to resign from his post as FIFA president, the BBC reported Thursday. Platini asked Blatter to step down at an emergency meeting of FIFA officials, and the longtime FIFA president balked at his former ally’s forthrightness.

“He (Platini) said he addressed Blatter ‘like a friend,’ but that the FIFA boss had told him it was ‘too late’ to resign,” the BBC claimed in its report.

Platini’s request came one day after the bombshell FIFA arrests, which rocked the soccer world and heaped more pressure and scrutiny on the embattled Blatter.

Blatter, 79, is running for his fifth term as FIFA president, and many are calling on world soccer’s governing body to postpone the election. Blatter is widely expected to defeat Prince Ali bin al-Hussein in Friday’s vote, but critics say FIFA needs a fresh start and new leadership, following news that Swiss and American authorities have opened criminal proceedings against senior officials in the organization.

Platini currently leads the charge for Blatter’s ouster, but FIFA electorate and the top boss himself likely will have the final say.

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Thumbnail photo via Walter Bieri/Keystone/The Associated Press