It was one of those accidental pinpoint landings again. On Thursday morning, the interim president Rainer Koch came under massive pressure after new revelations about his role in the DFB consultant affair and before the meeting of the state and regional presidents, the German Football Association published a short message. An ethics case against Koch, which concerned his behavior towards the former referee Bibiana Steinhaus-Webb, had been discontinued, he said. The clear message: an outright acquittal.
But now it is clear that the ethics affair is by no means over. Instead, it expands properly. Because the official representation of the DFB is grossly misleading because it suppresses important information, as the responsible members of the sports court made clear in a “personal statement” on Friday. In fact, the ethics chamber of the court – not to be confused with the recently remodeled, heavily affaired DFB ethics committee – came to the conclusion that Koch’s behavior in the complained case was “unethical”. In addition the warning: “In the case of recurrence” an indictment could be brought.
The process is unprecedented that the members of the independent sports court feel compelled to correct an official DFB representation for their decision so massively. But that’s not all: In view of the abstruse processes, it is now up to you whether the process has even been legally concluded. This question will now have to be clarified after the judges follow up.
The reason for the cause is an irritating conversation between Koch and Steinhaus-Webb
The boy piece shows again the tricks that are used around this process – with the recognizable goal of taking Koch, who is almighty in the DFB, out of the line of fire. The ethics case Koch goes back to an advertisement of the women’s initiative “Football can do more”, which advocates fundamental changes in German football. In the spring, the group included the former referee Steinhaus-Webb, who at that time still worked as a DFB video assistant and is now referee manager in the English Premier League. Steinhaus-Webb complained at the time that she had been pressured in the DFB not to participate in the reform group.
In this context, there were several discussions with Koch. This switched the referee into a phone call with a journalist of the Sports picture and then asked them to make certain statements to this third party. Steinhaus-Webb refused and found the situation “irritating” because she felt pressured.
The women’s initiative brought the case to the ethics committee. But when the committee around the Munich lawyer Bernd Knobloch addressed this and another submission to Koch, something amazing happened: With dubious maneuvers, the DFB top blew up the critical ethics staff and instead installed a committee under a personnel consultant, Irina Kummert. From then on, this entourage was supposed to work in the Koch’s sense – the suspicion arose from the bizarre transformation process that was ready for film.
Is the explosive addition part of the official decision or not?
However, according to the statutes, the ethics body cannot simply discontinue a process that has already started; it needs the approval of the ethics chamber at the sports court. This agreed, also bearing in mind that the annoyed Steinhaus-Webb does not want to continue the matter. However, the three judges made their approval subject to a clear, binding reservation. The behavior of the patron Koch was “unethical”, which the DFB ethics committee has to record in the decision. But now it is unclear whether she really did that.
On November 1st, the sports judges Holger Schindler, Wolfgang Otten and Michael Emde sent their cooking decision to the DFB ethicists. They stopped the proceedings, according to the DFB on November 23 – but without reporting to the sports court. The judges first had to request this decision, it was not available to them by Friday. Which is why one wonders what Kummert’s ethics combo really did. “If the decision is actually written without our addendum (Koch’s unethical behavior, d. Red.), Then this process is not completed,” said the responsible ethicist trio when asked by SZ.
The DFB announced on Friday evening that the ethics committee had given the reference to unethical behavior “in a cover letter to Dr. Koch”. And he argued: The sports court had not explicitly stated that the public should be informed. This is hypocritical, the judges think, they even provided the DFB and its loyal ethicists with a press release on November 1st. The question of whether the addition to Koch’s unethical actions is explicitly part of their decision, left Kummert and the DFB unanswered.