Thomas Bach, President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) since 2013, said to himself ” ready for a second term ”. He announced it, Friday July 17, at the opening of the 136th IOC session. The election is to take place in 2021.
Thomas Bach (66) has been an IOC member since 1991. He had succeeded the Belgian Jacques Rogge in 2013 and therefore completes an eight-year term. If he is re-elected – which is hardly in doubt – his second mandate will last only four years and it will be the last: according to the IOC statutes, a president can be renewed only once and for only four years.
Ninth President of the IOC, Thomas Bach was Olympic foil team champion at the Montreal (Canada) Games in 1976. He began his involvement in sports policy by becoming a spokesperson for athletes from West Germany in order to compete the Moscow Games in 1980, finally boycotted by his country to protest against the military intervention of the USSR in Afghanistan, in December 1979. He must face as president the global pandemic of coronavirus, which led the IOC to postpone the Tokyo Games by one year to 2021, a first in peacetime.
The controversial arrival of Sebastian Coe
Meeting in session «Virtual», the IOC must also act on the election of new members. Among them are the president of World Athletics, the International Athletics Federation, the Briton Sebastian Coe.
But for the latter (63), the road has been long. Despite his two Olympic titles over 1500 m (1980 and 1984) and his efforts since 2015 to redress the athletics federation in the midst of a corruption crisis, the former Conservative MP had to wait. Thomas Bach had indicated that his candidacy had not been selected due to the risks of ” conflict of interest “ more than “The door remains open”.
Sebastian Coe is the president of a consulting company, CSM, whose activities in the Olympic movement could create a conflict of interest. CSM manages the interests of hundreds of active and retired athletes such as the ex-Jamaican athlete Yohan Blake, the French tennis player Benoît Paire or the legend of All Blacks Dan Carter.
“What has changed is that Mr. Coe has undertaken to change his status within the company in which he holds the position of general manager, towards a passive position and that the necessary documentation is provided to the ethics committee by July 1 ”, said Bach in early June to explain why his «Love Seb» was now eligible.
Mr. Coe is now presented on the CSM website as the “non-executive president” of the company. However, he is active on social networks to promote a new podcast launched by himself for CSM at the beginning of the month and entitled « Extraordinary Tales in Extraordinary Times ».
If the entry of Mr. Coe to the IOC is not unanimous within the body, the IOC Ethics Commission confirmed on Thursday that “All the conditions had been fulfilled by Lord Coe on July 1, 2020, in particular that he had resigned from his executive position within CSM to act only as an adviser”.
Tokyo Olympics: all planned venues could be reserved for 2021
All the sites initially planned for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, postponed to the summer of 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic, have been able to be reserved, thereby removing a significant logistical obstacle, the Japanese organizers announced Friday (July 17th). The schedule of events will be similar to that which was planned for 2020, except for schedule changes in some cases, said the organizers in a statement.
The unprecedented decision to postpone the Games for a year poses a set of logistical difficulties and additional costs that have not yet been quantified. Tokyo 2020 will notably have to compensate the companies which had previously reserved for 2021 the numerous sites planned for the Olympic Games. Organizers are always looking for ways to cut costs, and opening and closing ceremonies are included in this reflection.
