European soccer governing body UEFA has announced that its president, Aleksander Čeferin, has accepted a proposal from all 55 UEFA member nations to seek re-election for a fourth and final term.
Čeferin had previously expressed his desire not to seek a fourth term in office, but has reneged on that decision at the behest of the UEFA members, and as such he will stand again for the final time at the 51st UEFA Ordinary Congress in Astana, Kazakhstan on April 22, 2027.
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Speaking on the decision, Čeferin said: “I want to thank the national associations for their trust. We have faced extraordinary challenges over the past years, and we have faced them as one team. There is still important work ahead, and I have therefore accepted their request.
“My ambition remains the same: to keep European football united, make our game stronger and leave UEFA ready for the next generation. I am also deeply grateful to my family. This decision asks a great deal of them too, and I could not have taken it without their understanding and support”.
Čeferin first took office in September 2016, beating Michael van Praag from the Netherlands to secure the election and replace Frenchman Michel Platini.
The 54-year-old was then re-elected by acclamation in February 2019 at the 43rd UEFA Congress in Rome.
His second re-election took place on April 5, 2023 at the 47th UEFA Congress held today in Lisbon, Portugal after UEFA previously announced he was the sole candidate in the running.
The unified support for the Slovenia from the UEFA members comes at a time when the body is embroiled in a tense war of words with global soccer governing body FIFA regarding the position of FIFA president Gianni Infantino.
At the end of August, UEFA filed documents in a Florida court which requested FIFA disclosed a range of evidence related to the now-infamous FIFA Forward Enterprise (FFE) scheme, which would have seen the game's global body essentially sell off minority stakes in a new commercial vehicle.
That entity would have managed the commercial affairs of iconic tournaments such as the men's FIFA World Cup, but following mass opposition from the soccer world, the plan was shelved in what amounted to a humiliating and public climb-down for Infantino, the idea's proponent.
In its filing, Switzerland-based UEFA said that Infantino – who is standing for presidential re-election in March next year – had engaged in "criminal mismanagement," and said that the scheme involved "a fraudulently off-market price promoted by [him] for his own benefit."
FIFA has refuted these claims, however, by saying that "[US attorney districts] faced with similar requests have outright rejected such applications."
UEFA has been applying to a Florida court in an attempt to access files from two FIFA subsidiaries – FIFA Americas and FWC2026 (which handled the 2026 World Cup), both of which are based in that state.
In the months that followed the plan being shelved, UEFA and its members have been at the forefront of calls for Infantino to resign, and for there to be a leadership change at the top of FIFA.
They now have until November 18 to put forward an alternative candidate to Infantino, who can run against him in the March election.
Various UEFA members initially called for a boycott of FIFA tournaments when FFE was first unveiled, but then withdrew such threats when Infantino said the project would not surface again.
