Platini was elected to a third five-year-term in March last year but was suspended in October over the payment and never returned to his office.
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World governing body Federation Internationale de Football Association gave the Frenchman permission to speak at the meeting in Athens.
Ceferin, the head of the Slovenian Football Association, was initially considered an outsider to replace disgraced former president Michel Platini but quickly emerged as favourite.
Slovenian lawyer and head of the Slovenian Football Federation, Aleksander Ceferin, won the election by securing 42 votes of the 55 cast.
In his final speech before the vote, Ceferin had seemingly aimed a thinly veiled dig at Van Praag’s “building bridges” manifesto promises by stating “building pitches is better”. “A page is turning and this is a new chapter for UEFA”, he said.
Aleksander Ceferin has described it as “a great honour and responsibility” to be named the new president of UEFA.
“It means a lot to me, it means me and my family are very proud. My family is very proud about it, my small and attractive Slovenia is very proud about it and I hope one day you will be very proud of me too”.
Van Praag was gracious in defeat. It was in Italy that Aleksander took the floor and said, ‘We are not enemies, ‘ and that is exactly how it is.
“We want a different UEFA, we want a better UEFA. But he wanted to do it his way and I wanted to do it my way”.
The rise of Ceferin, who was not involved with Uefa’s executive committee at all, was even more meteoric.
That settlement saw the number of guaranteed Champions League group-stage places for Europe’s strongest leagues – the Bundesliga, La Liga, Premier League and Serie A – go from 11 to 16, half of the total, with radical changes proposed for how the money is allocated.
“I am exhausted of the current situations and look forward to a normalisation period that will be about positive things”.
The European Professional Football Leagues (EPFL) last week vented their anger at the revamp of the Champions League and Europa League.
“Some people may have said that I am not a leader, that I am too young and too inexperienced to become the next UEFA president”.
Also speaking at the congress was Michel Platini, the former UEFA president now serving a four-year ban from football over a controversial payment, who had been granted permission by FIFA’s ethics committee to give a talk to the UEFA delegates.
“It’s very emotional for me to be here”, Platini told his audience which included FIFA President Gianni Infantino, the man who used to be his number two but who seized his opportunity to grab the most powerful role in world football, one that for so long seemed the destiny of his one-time boss.
“You are going to continue this attractive mission without me, for reasons that I do not wish to come back on”. “I want to thank everyone in this room who had the courage and loyalty to support me during the past months”. Vesel is also from Slovenia and plays on a veterans’ soccer team with Ceferin.
“Together we have done so much to keep that flame alive”.
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The only other candidate, the controversial Spanish acting Uefa president Angel Maria Villar Llona, pulled out of the contest earlier this month. Christillin was executive president of the bid committee and a vice-president of the Torino Organising Committee (TOROC).
