The head of Norwegian football has accused FIFA of fear tactics for the removal of a senior official who publicly opposed FIFA president Gianni Infantino's now-withdrawn World Cup sell-off plan.
Lise Klaveness, the head of the Norwegian Football Federation since 2022, told the Associated Press that the firing of FIFA's chief operating officer Kevin Lamour was "unacceptable" and urged other senior leaders to resist potentially damaging orders.
Mr Lamour's exit on Tuesday (AEST) came 17 days after his statement to AP criticising Mr Infantino's $US20 billion ($28.1 billion) private equity project, which was withdrawn hours later.
"Now he is thrown out and we are supposed to move on. It's unacceptable, it's management by fear," Ms Klaveness told the AP in a telephone interview, describing Mr Lamour as "the best football administrator I have ever met".
"Now we also have to call upon FIFA leadership and the administration to not submit to orders you know are not in the interests of football," Ms Klaveness added, especially targeting FIFA secretary general Mattias Grafström.
Ms Klaveness represented Norway 73 times as a player, is a judge in Oslo and an elected executive committee member at European football body UEFA.
She has built on her country's long-held reputation as a champion of good governance in soccer.
Last week the Norwegian federation's board called on Mr Infantino to resign and has backed a London-based NGO's formal complaint to FIFA ethics investigators about his political ties to US President Donald Trump.
Mr Lamour was a long-time colleague of Mr Infantino, first when they were senior officials at UEFA from 2007-15. He was involved in Mr Infantino's campaign to be elected FIFA president in 2016 and moved two years ago from UEFA to oversee much of FIFA's operations in Zurich.
With a reputation among the most trusted executives in the often murky world of global football politics, Mr Lamour's pointed criticisms of Mr Infantino's leadership intensified a crisis for the FIFA president.
A backlash from UEFA, the Asian Football Confederation and north American soccer body CONCACAF was provoked by a secretive plan to sell future World Cup profits to investors led by Joshua Kushner.
A $4.2 billion investment to take a 20 per cent stake in a FIFA commercial spin-off was to fund offers of $20 million to each of its 211 national member federations.
They already effectively own the non-profit soccer body, which has multi-billion dollar reserves, and would have had a mid-September deadline to accept.
Mr Lamour's statement on July 31 spoke of FIFA staff being "deceived" by Mr Infantino's lack of openness over the now-failed sale and how they "deserve better than contempt and intimidation".
The French executive called on soccer leaders worldwide "to make the right decisions".
"If that means I lose my job, then so be it," he said at the conclusion of the statement.
"I will understand and respect that decision. At least I'll sleep well tonight."
Ms Klaveness said Mr Lamour's exit was "a firing situation, it's not a resignation", and suggested it was done as a result of Mr Grafström "obviously being pressured by the president".
FIFA didn't respond to a request for comment on Ms Klaveness's remarks.
In a statement, FIFA said it "thanks Kevin for his two years of service and wishes him the best of luck for the future. No further comment will be made on the matter".
Mr Lamour did not immediately reply to an email seeking comment on Wednesday (AEST).
"His statement was necessary to kill the project," Ms Klaveness said of Mr Lamour's intervention.
Mr Infantino held a meeting with senior management — minus Mr Lamour — in Rabat, Morocco on August 5.
Following that, FIFA issued a statement apologising for errors and said those managers who attended "reaffirmed their full support" for Mr Infantino's presidency.
"We all got reports in Morocco, we know it's a management of fear," Ms Klaveness said.
"It's not in football's best interests."
Until the uproar over Mr Infantino's "FIFA Forward Enterprise" proposal, he seemed sure to be re-elected unopposed next year in Morocco for a fourth and final term in office through 2031.
Challengers have until November 18 to enter the contest.
Though UEFA and other critics of Mr Infantino want him ousted from the $6 million-per-year FIFA job, Ms Klaveness said any search for an opponent was not a talking point in Norway.
"We are not there at all and that is 100 per cent the truth," she said, adding that any candidate would have to be "very accountable to a governance structure that will not in four or five years just deteriorate".
Mr Infantino was appointed by UEFA in 2015 to a panel advising FIFA on reforms, in fallout from corruption scandals provoked by US federal investigations.
That group's recommendations limiting FIFA presidents to 12 years in office, plus limiting their executive powers and patronage all have retreated under Mr Infantino.
Ms Klaveness acknowledged FIFA members had been less "passionate about the details of governance" than Norway.
Mr Lamour also won praise and support from UEFA vice-president Laura McAllister, also a former player and now a university professor of governance in Wales, who lamented the "shabby events of the past weeks".
"Kevin's sacking seriously weakens FIFA's administration whilst undermining this unique opportunity to shift the culture at FIFA and to reset the organisation on sporting values, not simply commercial and financial ones," Ms McAllister said.
