The President of the Superior Sports Council (CSD), José Ramón Lete, announced today after the meeting of the Directive Committee of the organization the temporary suspension of Ángel María Villar as president of the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) and vice president Juan Padrón for one year.

"The Directive Committee has unanimously agreed to suspend Mr. Villar and Mr. Padrón for one year, which can be reconsidered according to events," Lete said at the end of the meeting, which lasted just over an hour.

Villar has been in prison since the 20th of last month following the 'Soule' operation, for which Judge Santiago Pedraz of the National Court accuses him of mismanagement, misappropriation and/or fraud, forgery of documents, and corruption among individuals.

His son, Gorka Villar, and the first vice president of the RFEF and responsible for the Tenerife territorial federation, Juan Padrón, are also imprisoned in the same operation.

The suspension of Villar and Padrón has been agreed unanimously by the twelve members present today out of the fourteen members of the Directive Committee of the CSD, since the President of the Pelota Federation, Julián García, and the Director of the Paralympic Committee, Alberto Jofre, were absent.

Lete specified that in the case of Padrón, the CSD has requested that the Royal Spanish Football Federation certify whether he belongs to a governing and control body of the RFEF in the new Board of Directors, whose changes were to be announced this Tuesday at the Ciudad del Fútbol de Las Rozas, since the CSD can only suspend positions that are part of a governing and control body.

The President of the CSD explained that the organization he presides will urge the RFEF to replace the president using the mechanisms provided in article 34.7 of its Bylaws, which states that in the event of "absence, illness or any other cause," the president shall be replaced by one of the vice presidents, the treasurer, or the member with the longest seniority or oldest age in the Board of Directors.

Finally, Lete confirmed that the CSD will act as a private prosecutor in the judicial proceedings that are taking place in the 'Soule' case, always in accordance with the criteria of the State Attorney General's Office and "at the appropriate procedural time."

The decision of the CSD comes after the Administrative Court of Sport (TAD) unanimously decided on Monday to initiate disciplinary proceedings against Villar, at the request of the Superior Sports Council.

This TAD proceeding, which could lead to the disqualification of Ángel María Villar, will be suspended until a judicial resolution is reached in the proceedings currently underway in the National Court, as stated by the Court in its resolution yesterday.

The suspension decided today falls within the powers of the Directive Committee of the CSD to temporarily and provisionally suspend, for justified reasons, the president and other members of the governing and control bodies of Spanish sports federations and professional leagues, according to the cases set forth in article 43, b) and c), of the Sports Law of 1990.

Said article 43 c) grants the aforementioned committee the authority to "temporarily and provisionally, for justified reasons, suspend the president or any other members of the governing bodies when disciplinary proceedings are initiated against them as a result of alleged very serious infractions or irregularities subject to sanction, defined as such in article 76 of this Law."

This afternoon, at the headquarters of the Royal Spanish Football Federation in Las Rozas (Madrid), the Delegated Committee of the RFEF will meet, which was postponed last week after the searches carried out at the federation's headquarters on Tuesday the 18th.

For tomorrow, Wednesday, the Assembly is scheduled, which was supposed to have taken place on Thursday the 20th, and at which the CSD will be represented by the Deputy Director General of Legal Regime, Ramón Barba, and the Deputy Director General of High Competition, Carlos Gascón.