The General Assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC) will not only analyze the effect of the pandemic on sport and what it will mean in a post-covid world, but also the functioning of its 206 NOCs, some of them with serious problems.
In the case of the Americas, for example, Around The Rings confirmed that the outgoing president of the Olympic Committee of Guatemala, Gerardo Aguirre, and the president-elect of the Olympic Committee of Ecuador, Jorge Delgado, are in the Greek island of Crete, site of the world forum this Sunday and Monday, to request to be heard by IOC president Thomas Bach and other officials.
Bach has confirmed his presence, and in the inaugural session he will address a message to the NOC representatives of the five continents, a good part of them present in the auditorium and others connected from their nations.
Aguirre denounces a “political manipulation” by which he was vetoed to participate in the elections of his Olympic committee, in which he considered his reelection to be certain.
Delgado is still unable to formally take possession of his seat for apparently bureaucratic reasons, in a process in which, surprisingly, a letter addressed to Bach from IOC honorary member, Peruvian Ivan Dibós, with a request for new Ecuadorian elections, has become known.
“There has definitely been a manipulation of the electoral process and a direct responsibility of the government,” Aguirre told Around the Rings.
Two weeks ago, the Federated Sports Electoral Tribunal (TEDEFE) prevented the registration of the slate headed by Aguirre, current president of the COG Executive Committee, due to the lack of “finiquito”, the proof issued by the General Controller of Accounts that there are no problems with the administration of resources.
This veto caused a slate led by former soccer player Jorge Rodas to be the only one to run and win with only nine valid votes and 28 null votes, out of 37 accredited voters.
This week there were seven challenges to this result of the electoral process formulated by the same number of federations.
The Guatemalan Willi Kaltschmitt, honorary member of the IOC, has also expressed criticism of “irregularities” that closed the access to the registration of Aguirre’s slate.
Kaltschmitt is a fervent defender of the Sports Law established in his country, which guarantees its autonomy by constitutional precept.
On the other hand, this Friday it was known that a court found causes to grant a provisional injunction against the Electoral Tribunal of Federated Sports, considering “anomalies and illegalities” in the virtually winning slate headed by Jorge Rodas.
This legal instance has ordered “to suspend the election process and not to continue developing the following stages until the appropriate resolution”.
“I am trying to arrange an audience with the IOC authorities,” Aguirre said from Crete.
“I have brought the whole documentary file with me so that the IOC is aware of what is being attempted and of the intervention we are facing from the government”, remarked the current president of the COG, who is due to leave office on December 7.
Aguirre denied financial mismanagement in his administration and rejected a complaint for an alleged violation of requirements with the sending of officials, together with athletes and coaches, to comply with the vaccination sponsored by Panam Sports at the University of Miami, with a view to the Olympic Games in Tokyo.
The Olympic leader assures that this denunciation was “dismissed” by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of his country after proving its “political-electoral blocking purposes”.
Aguirre said that the COG is annually subjected to three audits, including one carried out by the IOC through the firm Price-Waterhouse. “We have been evaluated correctly, with no anomalous handling.”
Former Olympic swimmer Jorge Delgado is still unable to formally take office as president of the Ecuadorian Olympic Committee, but despite this he traveled to Greece to take his seat as president-elect.
Delgado, who almost two months ago won a tense election that ended 37-37, decided by a second vote of the outgoing president, explained to Around The Rings that his executive has not yet been registered by the Ministry of Sport of his country, despite being recognized by the IOC.
“Everything is in order, but the new minister does not register the new COE executive, apparently because of some letters from some federations,” Delgado commented. “But he has nothing to verify.”
“I plan to talk to Bach and I have already been talking to the Olympic authorities that have to do with this issue, that’s why I came here, besides representing Ecuador,” said the former swimmer.
But Delgado, first Olympic finalist in the history of Ecuador, has also criticized the Peruvian honorary member of the IOC, Ivan Dibos, who from Peru sent a letter addressed to Thomas Bach in which he asks for the COE elections to be repeated, which he calls “a questioned election process”.
Delgado described as “interference in Ecuador’s internal affairs” Dibós’ letter, which “in spite of being personal, was published in Ecuadorian newspapers”.
Apparently, Delgado intends to protest Dibós’ position before the IOC.
In a letter dated October 12, the veteran Peruvian leader regretted that the IOC concluded that the election process was carried out without objections, since “there were several anomalies denounced during and after it”.
Dibós criticized the IOC and Panam Sports observer at the COE assembly, the Nicaraguan Juan Santiago Estrada, for ignoring what he considers “flagrant violations” of the Olympic Charter, the Ecuadorian sports law and the COE statute, denounced by several National Federations.
Dibós explains that his letter is due to his “close ties with the sport of that country (Ecuador), so close to mine”, and because “the Ecuadorian Olympic Movement needs to be strengthened, so that these situations are never repeated, and the best way to do it is from the legality and legitimacy of the actions of its Olympic Committee and all the other bodies that comprise it”.
On September 6, the IOC, through Jerome Poivey, head of Institutional Relations and Governance of the organization, formally recognized the election of Jorge Delgado.
KEEP READING:
Últimas Noticias
Sinner-Alcaraz, the duel that came to succeed the three phenomenons
Beyond the final result, Roland Garros left the feeling that the Italian and the Spaniard will shape the great duel that came to help us through the duel for the end of the Federer-Nadal-Djokovic era.
Table tennis: Brazil’s Bruna Costa Alexandre will be Olympic and Paralympic in Paris 2024
She is the third in her sport and the seventh athlete to achieve it in the same edition; in Santiago 2023 she was the first athlete with disabilities to compete at the Pan American level and won a medal.
Rugby 7s: the best player of 2023 would only play the medal match in Paris
Argentinian Rodrigo Isgró received a five-game suspension for an indiscipline in the circuit’s decisive clash that would exclude him until the final or the bronze match; the Federation will seek to make the appeal successful.
Rhonex Kipruto, owner of the world record for the 10000 meters on the road, was suspended for six years
The Kenyan received the maximum sanction for irregularities in his biological passport and the Court considered that he was part of a system of “deliberate and sophisticated doping” to improve his performance. He will lose his record and the bronze medal at the Doha World Cup.
Katie Ledecky spoke about doping Chinese swimmers: “It’s difficult to go to Paris knowing that we’re going to compete with some of these athletes”
The American, a seven-time Olympic champion, referred to the case of the 23 positive controls before the Tokyo Games that were announced a few weeks ago and shook the swimming world. “I think our faith in some of the systems is at an all-time low,” he said.
