Liz Claveness doesn’t pull any punches. It’s not her style. For some, this is a problem. For Klaveness, a former national team player who is now president of the Football Association of Norway, it’s just her.
So Fifa will be informed about its moral conflicts, about the treatment of migrant workers in World Cup projects, about the rights of women and gays. She is happy, if necessary, to say so directly to the (mostly male) officials at FIFA assemblies, asking them, as football’s leaders, to hold the sport – and themselves – to higher moral and ethical standards.
“Politically, it made me more exposed, and maybe people want to say to me, ‘Who do you think you are?'” “In different ways,” Klavenice, 42, said in an interview ahead of the Women’s World Cup. She said publicly asking questions about human rights and good governance “has a price”.
She also believes that her positions reflect the positions of her federation and her country. She says she will not stop pressuring them. She said, “I’m so excited, and the day I don’t, I’m going to quit. I have nothing to lose.”