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Five referees suspended, accused of rigging matches

Five Kenyan first division football referees have been suspended on temporary suspensions over charges of match fixing and manipulation of local Premier League results, the federation said on Saturday. According to the Kenya Football Federation (FKF), this decision was taken to preserve the integrity of the competitions, called into question by a large-scale investigation launched after the exclusion for life by the FIFA in February 2020 of four players who participated in “an international conspiracy to fix matches”.

Two of the referees suspended on Saturday, Raymond Onyango and Isaac Memusi, were removed from the FIFA referee list at the start of the season after failing physical tests. “The ethics department of the federation, with the assistance of FIFA, has started preliminary investigations against these individuals in order to establish their involvement, if there is any, in these manipulations of matches”, declared FKF General Secretary Barry Otieno in a statement.

In May, FIFA announced the relegation from the national first division of Zoo Kericho, a major Kenyan football club involved in match-fixing. Barry Otieno said the federation remains confident in the integrity of the Kenyan Premier League.

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