BRASILIA – A messy legal battle over the Brazilian Football Confederation’s (CBF) leadership took a new twist on Jan 4 when a Supreme Court judge ordered its ousted president reinstated, after Fifa threatened sanctions.

The preliminary ruling suspended a lower-court decision and restored the job to Ednaldo Rodrigues, the CBF’s first black president.

The CBF has faced a maelstrom of controversy over the legal squabble, the national team’s poor performance and a failed bid to sign Real Madrid boss Carlo Ancelotti as coach.

“I hereby suspend the effects of the ruling by the Rio de Janeiro Court of Justice... and order the immediate reinstatement to their positions of the leadership elected by the CBF general assembly of March 23, 2022,” judge Gilmar Mendes wrote.

The temporary ruling takes immediate effect, but must now go before the full 11-member Supreme Court.

The lower court’s December ruling had thrown out a 2022 deal between the CBF and Rio prosecutors that had paved the way for Rodrigues’ election to lead the body until 2026.

It ruled prosecutors and the CBF had overstepped their authority in making the deal.

The case dates back to 2017, when the CBF changed its election rules without consulting representatives of Brazil’s top-flight clubs, whose voting power was weakened.

The winner of the ensuing presidential election, Rogerio Caboclo, was sacked in 2021 over sexual harassment accusations – later thrown out by a judge.

Rodrigues was named his interim replacement.

A Rio court, meanwhile, annulled Caboclo’s election because of the rule change, and Rodrigues won the substitute vote – the subject of the current dispute.

The lower-court ruling on Dec 7 removed Rodrigues and named the head of Brazil’s Superior Court of Justice for Sport, Jose Perdiz, as interim CBF chief pending new elections, which it ordered him to call within 30 days.

The court battle has unleashed a swirl of speculation over possible manipulation behind the scenes in Brazil’s sometimes corruption-stained football world.

Fifa and the South American Football Confederation (Conmebol) had warned the CBF in a series of letters that Brazil could be barred from international competitions if it was shown to be allowing external interference in its affairs, according to Brazilian media reports.

The ruling comes a day before the deadline to register the Brazilian national team for the Olympic qualifiers in Venezuela in January.

Had Fifa and Conmebol refused to accept Perdiz’s signature on the documents, Brazil could have been excluded from the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

Brazil’s participation in 2026 World Cup qualifiers and the upcoming Copa America could also be at risk, as well as its clubs’ participation in international competitions.

The court battle comes at a delicate time for the CBF, which is struggling to restore the Brazilian national team to its glory days amid a string of poor results, including a humiliating run of three straight losses in their latest World Cup qualifiers. AFP