Norway's FA chief demands FIFA boss Infantino resign over governance crisis

Lise Klaveness, president of the Norwegian Football Federation, stood before reporters in Stockholm on Friday and delivered a stark judgment: Gianni Infantino, FIFA's president, no longer possessed the institutional trust required to lead world football. She did not hedge. "There is no going back for Gianni Infantino," she said, calling directly for his resignation.

Klaveness, a 45-year-old lawyer who has led the Norwegian federation since March 2022, framed her demand not as a personal grievance but as a structural necessity. The international football system, she argued, was in crisis—fractured by bitter disputes between governing bodies, most recently ignited by FIFA's now-abandoned proposal to monetize a portion of the World Cup's commercial rights. That conflict had exposed deep rifts in how the sport's leadership operated. "The international football cooperation is very much in trouble," Klaveness told reporters, "and we must have a reason to get together now." She was signaling that Infantino himself had become an obstacle to that gathering.

The Norwegian position was not new. Norway had declined to support Infantino in the 2023 election and would not back him again in March 2026. But Klaveness was now escalating the rhetoric, and she was explicit about her hope that other UEFA nations would follow. She acknowledged the political uncertainty—"We will see which other countries eventually join in"—but made clear that Norway intended to press the case directly with FIFA leadership rather than calling for an emergency UEFA board meeting. The calculation was strategic: build momentum through bilateral conversations with other confederations, then present Infantino with a coalition demanding change.

Klaveness methodically catalogued the grievances that had accumulated during her tenure. Questions about how tournaments were awarded. The FIFA peace prize given to U.S. President Donald Trump in December. The reversal of a ban on American forward Folarin Balogun following a call from Trump during the recent World Cup. Each incident, in her view, pointed to a governance system that had lost its moorings—one where commercial interests and political pressure could override established procedures.

She was careful to deflect speculation that she herself might run for FIFA's top job. Her name had circulated among potential successors, but she dismissed the notion as premature and beside the point. "We have no reason to comment on that or any other candidacy, nor are we ready for it," she said. The focus, she insisted, had to remain on the structural problem, not on personalities.

In a separate conversation with Reuters, Klaveness deployed a more vivid metaphor. World football had become trapped in "Game of Thrones," she said—the television drama famous for its ruthless power struggles and shifting alliances. That was not governance; that was theater. What the sport needed was a leader capable of moving beyond factional maneuvering and toward genuine institutional reform. Infantino, in her assessment, could not be that leader. The polarization was too deep, the crisis too real. "Sometimes polarisation and crisis can be of use," she acknowledged, "but it's only of use if we can gather now around... actual implementation of governance reform. But he cannot do it."

Klaveness outlined what she believed FIFA's next leader must accomplish: real implementation of checks and balances, lasting structural change, and a clear reorientation of FIFA's mission. The organization, she argued, had drifted into competing commercially with its own confederations—acting as a business developer rather than a governing body. That had to end. "The stable future is a FIFA where it's first and foremost a governing body for international football and not a business developer that competes with confederations." It was a vision of institutional clarity, and it implicitly suggested that Infantino had lost sight of it.