By Paul Nicholson
September 6 – Aleksander Čeferin has dismissed as “insulting” reports that he has made a series of promises to the Nordic federations in support for their votes in the election for the successor to Michel Platini to the UEFA presidency on September 14 in Athens, Greece.
Four of the six Nordic federations released a statement in June that they supported Čeferin’s candidature. It has now been reported in Norwegian football website Josimar that in return the Nordic nations would get support for a bid for the 2024 or 2028 Euros as well as promising an executive committee seat for Swedish FA president Karl-Erik Nilsson.
Speaking to Insideworldfootball, Čeferin said of the support for a Nordic Euros bid: “This is a completely ridiculous accusation. These decisions will be taken by the old exco, how can I influence that? I had never heard that (of the Nordic Euros bid), it never came up in conversation. I read in a newspaper that they wanted to run.”
As regards an exco seat for Nilsson, Čeferin says there were “absolutely no promises. He (Nilsson) is a very modest and very clever guy, he would never ask and I would never promise anything. Congress decides…It is an insulting accusation to us both. How can I promise something I can’t deliver?”
But Čeferin goes even further saying that “wherever I went no-one explicity asked for anything (favours). I was a bit surprised.”
The Nordic nations will meet all three candidates – Čeferin, Michael van Praag and Maria Angel Villar – in Copenhagen on Thursday (September 8). It seems likely that those meetings will confirm their voting decisions and whether they vote as a block (which they have done traditionally) or whether their votes will be split.
Čeferin says that too many people outside of UEFA are looking at the geography of where his candidature comes from and that sometimes “public support (by federations) can take something away…nobody understands how this guy from Slovenia could be standing but it should be about the competence (of the candidate) to do the job.”
Čeferin is of course not the only Slovenian to emerge at the top table of recent football in recent months. Tomaž Vesel, the new independent chairperson of FIFA’s Audit and Compliance Committee who took over from Domenico Scala is also from Slovenia.
Asked whether he had anything to do in the appointment of Vesel he says he was asked for a reference by “a friend close to FIFA” after Vesel had been approached. “I told him he was more than competent – that is it. If he can audit Slovenia (Vesel was Slovenia’s Auditor General) then he can audit FIFA. You see one Slovenian and everyone gets excited (when you see a second. It should be about) are we competent or not.”
The links between Čeferin and Vesel, and the appointment of former Norwegian FA general secretary Kjetil Siem to FIFA president Gianni Infantino’s staff (Siem worked hard for Infantino during the FIFA election) has lead to speculation that Čeferin is Infantino’s preferred candidate, part of his Infantino’s bid to have ‘his’ people in control of key football positions globally.
But Čeferin says that Infantino has never given him his support and that he hasn’t spoken to him since the Champions League final in Milan in June. “The conversation was detailed and I doubt that he said anything different to me than what he probably said to the other candidates. There were some positive messages, nothing specific was mentioned.”
But, he joked, “if he thinks I am good, then OK.”
One report had been that Infantino had sent Siem to lobby the Nordic vote for Čeferin. But, in an interview with Insideworldfootball this week, Dutch football chief Michael van Praag, Ceferin’s main contender for the presidency, said he had been assured by Infantino that that he had not been trying to lobby support behind the scenes for the Slovenian.
The UEFA presidency is a key position in world football that looks to become increasingly a soft geo-political on the world stage. But Čeferin makes it clear that he doesn’t feel or fear pressure from anyone. “I don’t have a pressure from any side, and anyway, what could I do about it/’” he said.
“In Slovenia we are close to the east and the west, the north and the south. We are an open-minded people. You don’t know me yet but I won’t be put under pressure. I have quite a big law firm, a big job and a nice family. There is no pressure…maybe that is to come.”
But the one pressure he is very clear about is the pressure building within UEFA’s federations for change. “I am not so arrogant to think this (election) is about me. People are fed up with the (UEFA) exco and its favourtism and its exclusivity like a club not connected to its members.”
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