Wigan Athletic owner Dave Whelan has been handed a six-week ban from all football-related activities and a £50,000 fine for recent remarks made about Chinese and Jewish people.

The 78-year-old accepted a charge last month but strongly denied making racist remarks, and requested a non-personal hearing from the Football Association, which gave the punishment.

Despite this, the FA Disciplinary Commission said it was "satisfied" that Whelan "is not a racist" and did not intend to cause offence by his comments. He will now complete a programme of education, provided by the FA.

Whelan has maintained that he was misquoted in an interview with the Guardian last month, during which he used the term "chink". The Guardian also reported that the businessman claimed: "Jewish people chase money more than everybody else."

Whelan has since apologised for any offence caused by his comments, made while defending the appointment of Malky Mackay - also under investigation by the FA - as the Championship club's new manager.

Earlier in December, the FA decided that Whelan's comments constituted an aggravated breach of rule E3[1], ruling that his comments were "abusive and/or insulting and/or constitute improper conduct and/or bring the game into disrepute" and subsequently charged him.

The FA Commission has now stated: "We are satisfied on the evidence before us that Mr Whelan is not a racist.

"We are equally satisfied on the evidence before us that Mr Whelan did not intend to cause any offence by his comments."

However, the commission stressed that it had to "view the comments objectively and Mr Whelan's subjective intentions were irrelevant as far the ruling was concerned".

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Sam France
Former Deputy Editor-in-Chief and Features Editor at VAVEL UK, part of the VAVEL team 2014-2018.