Honesty is Needed, Not Only Independence -- OpEd

LAUSANNE, November, 4, 2016 - Recently, the "independent observers, independent person" formula has been very fashionable in the world of sport. However, who and what they are ‘independent’ from is never explained in detail. There’s a certain confusion present, and it is not only etymological.

What is impossible to understand is why, instead of looking for independent people who, in the end, aren’t so independent, it isn’t honest people that are sought after. And I assure you, there are still many of those.

The word honesty is never used. Transparency is referred to repeatedly, which in the end, means, excuse me if I say it, bugger all, because what it has become is no more than a transparent smokescreen which hides the real outlines of dishonesty.

The latest report from the Independent Observer Team for the Rio Games on anti-doping operations is truly surprising. A shocking 50% of the spot checks in the Olympic Village were missed, very few blood tests were made because the contract with the company expected to provide specialist technicians fell through on the eve of the Games. Many doping chaperones disappeared and those that remained weren’t trained, the doctors called on were also underpaid... However, the conclusion was that, in the end, everything went well due to the willingness of those who undertook the task assigned to them and did so positively.

The Russians at Sochi 2014 created an almost perfect system for replacing the samples of their champions, but there still lies a doubt as to whether they might have had accomplices in the Olympic family. It was all too easy - there were no video surveillance of that particular area of the samples warehouse and no closing of the offices at midnight.

In Rio, there were video cameras in place and everything had been correctly designed except that, we believe involuntarily, it led to the ‘rule of chaos’.

Let’s explain. In Sochi, the samples were manipulated to prevent the tracing of prohibited products in the blood and urine in the future – as is now being done with the retests of athletes from Beijing 2008 and London 2012 – and the trick failed.

So what would be the best, cleanest and safest solution to avoid future scandals? To simply not do the tests!

This is certainly not a new discovery, given that the International Amateur Boxing Association (AIBA) didn’t conduct a single spot check in 2015, claiming that it is well known that all of their athletes are all clean. And no-one at the IOC lifted a finger.

So the rule of chaos, a "lack of coordination" created, we hope involuntarily, the chance to avoid testing. In the end, only seven athletes in Rio were caught red-handed. So was it really a clean Olympics? Perhaps.

What’s difficult for us to understand is why the anti-doping teams were unable to make spot checks on so many athletes in the Village. Did they escape like Kenteris and Thanou in Athens 2004? The two Greeks were then disqualified - they paid for their escape. We’ve had no news about those who avoided the tests in Rio and no provisions were made. More than 200 checks that were conducted were useless because the urine collected was insufficient.

It feels almost cruel to continue rattling off the list of things that didn’t work in Rio, but what we have to ask is that at least a light is cast.

The news that, one morning, an anti-doping team took a sample from a coach instead of his athlete was quite astonishing. This could have been just an isolated case but, in the light of what has been uncovered so far, it could have happened many more times, too, because the staff assigned to take the samples didn’t have the necessary skills.

Was it just unlucky or a diabolical plan? Perhaps half and half. This is why what we should be demanding is notoriously honest people, who were delicately pushed to one side, to be called back to the front line to re-launch real credibility.

Summits are of no use if there is no intellectual honesty.

Gianni Merlo isPresident of AIPS, the International Sports Press Association, and a reporter forGazzetta dello Sport.