Aleksander Ceferin is seeking another term as president of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and will run for re-election this coming April. According to dpa reports, the Slovenian announced his candidacy at a meeting in Berlin, officially ruling himself out as a potential challenger to Gianni Infantino for the FIFA presidency.
Ceferin had already repeatedly dismissed any ambitions of challenging the FIFA president. The same Berlin meeting had earlier brought together European soccer leaders to discuss strategy regarding Infantino's position at FIFA, with Ceferin joined in August by fellow FIFA vice presidents from Asia and North America in publicly accusing Infantino of deception and breach of trust over a World Cup sell-off plan, according to previous reporting. None of those vice presidents currently appears set to stand against Infantino.
The election for another four-year UEFA term will take place at the UEFA Congress on April 22 in Astana, Kazakhstan. So far there is no opposing candidate, and any challenger at this point would reportedly stand little chance against Ceferin, who has held the role since September 2016.
A change to UEFA's bylaws in 2024 made this re-election bid possible. The federation's rules set a twelve-year term limit, but because Ceferin took over his first term from Michel Platini, who was suspended at the time, that term no longer counts toward the limit following the amendment.
Ceferin had actually announced two and a half years ago that he did not intend to run again, saying he was "tired" and that UEFA needed "fresh blood." He reversed that position internally relatively quickly and announced his renewed candidacy at the high-level meeting in Berlin.
