Three former South African Football officials have been banned from the sport in connection with international friendlies played by the national side in 2010.
The South African football team. Photo: PHOTOSPORT
Leslie Sedibe, a former chief executive of the South African Football Association (SAFA), was banned for five years and fined 30 thousand dollars by FIFA's Ethics Committee.
Steve Goddard and Adeel Carelse, both former heads of the SAFA's refereeing department, were each banned for two years, football's governing body said in a statement.
The cases were linked to that of former SAFA executive member and head of referees Lindile Kika, who was banned for six years by FIFA last October.
FIFA said that Sedibe, Goddard and Carelse had all infringed ethics rules concerning general rules of conduct, loyalty and disclosure, cooperation and reporting.
The investigations were conducted by FIFA's Ethics Committee along with the security division, which is responsible for fighting match-fixing.
A previous FIFA investigation had looked into warm-up matches that South Africa played against Thailand, Bulgaria, Colombia and Guatemala in May 2010 ahead of the World Cup, which South Africa was hosting.
In 2012, FIFA handed SAFA a 500-page report that documented the activities of convicted Singapore-based match-fixer Wilson Perumal and his Football 4U organisation.
Chris Eaten, FIFA's head of security at the time, said that Perumal's company had provided the match officials for the four games under investigation.
South Africa usually invites match officials from neighbouring countries to handle home friendlies, but agreed to Perumal's offer to fly in officials from Kenya, Niger and Togo for the four matches.
South Africa were handed two disputed penalties in their 2-1 victory over Colombia in Johannesburg on May 27, 2010. One of the kicks was ordered to be retaken twice after the initial efforts were both saved. Colombia's goal also came from a penalty.
Four days later, South Africa were awarded another two spot kicks in their 5-0 win over Guatemala in Polokwane.
Match fixing is often organised by betting syndicates who make money by correctly gambling on the result of the match they have manipulated.
-Reuters
