March 1 – The president of leading Egyptian side Zamalek, Mortada Mansour (pictured), has been jailed for a month for “verbally insulting” his counterpart at bitter Cairo rivals Al Ahly.
Al Ahly chairman Mahmoud El-Khatib had filed two defamation cases against Mansour for the latter’s comments back in 2021 in a video that appeared on social media and the Zamalek club channel.
Mansour, who is also a politician and former member of parliament, had previously used parliamentary immunity to protect him from such lawsuits.
But he was found guilty and initially sentenced to a year behind bars that was reduced to one month on appeal.
According to Egyptian law, he will not be able to return to his position as president because anyone convicted of a crime judged to impact reputation, honesty, honour or integrity is not entitled to obtain or occupy a public position.
It is not the first time that Mansour has landed himself in hot water with some of his comments.
In 2007, he was sentenced to three years in jail by a criminal court in Cairo for insulting court officials and calling them corrupt, while in 2018 the Confederation of African Football banned the 70-year-old from all football-related activity following a comment about CAF officials.
He was also a vocal critic of Mark Clattenburg, the former English referee who was briefly in charge of the Egyptian Referees Committee.
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