Pylos, Mar. 19, (dpa/GNA) – The International Olympic Committee (IOC) elects a new president on Thursday in succession of Thomas Bach from seven candidates, and the winner will face huge challenges in the top job in world sport.
The outcome of the vote by the IOC membership in Pylos is anyone’s guess, or as one of the candidates, Jordan’s Prince Feisal al-Huseein put it: “It is too tight to predict anything.”
However, three candidates are seen as favourites: World Athletics president Sebastian Coe of Britain; Spain’s Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr, the son of long-time IOC boss Juan Antonio Samaranch Sr; and Zimbabwean sports minister Kirsty Coventry, who like Coe is a double Olympic champion and would be the first woman and first African atop the IOC.
The vote has been compared with a Catholic Church conclave to find a new pope.
An absolute majority from the 100+ IOC members is needed, and several rounds of voting are expected because the candidate with the lowest amount of votes is eliminated. The IOC members must leave their mobile phones and other electronic devices outside the room.
The 10th IOC president will be confronted with issues including geopolitical tensions ranging from the Ukraine war to the Gaza conflict, and a new administration led by Donald Trump in the US which hosts the 2028 Games in Los Angeles.
Gender issues and climate change, making it more difficult to find future Winter Olympics hosts, are other important tasks.
The new president will officially start in June which allows a transition phase with Germany’s Bach still present as his 12-year mandate winds down.
Coe wants change
Strict rules applied in the bidding phase which each candidate given only 15 minutes to present their manifesto to IOC members in January, with no questions allowed.
“Is this best way to choose our new leader? No,” Coe has said, calling for more openness.
Coe, 68, stands for the biggest change from Bach’s course if he is elected. He has detected “an appetite for change” with the IOC membership which he said wants more responsibility again.
But at the same time the IOC is rather conservative and Coe’s changes may be considered too much, and because Coe is 68 a charter change would be needed that he can complete a first eight-year mandate.
Going by CV alone, Coe is almost unrivalled among the candidates.
After winning 1,500m gold in 1980 and 1984, he was an MP, is a House of Lords member, was president of the British Olympic Association, chief organizer of the London 2012 Games, and World Athletics president since 2015.
“I hope that the IOC members will also be guided by what I have achieved. And I have always delivered when I have tackled something,” Coe recently told the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung.
History through Coventry?
Coventry, 41, would meanwhile make history as the first woman and first from Africa atop the IOC, and she has insisted that “women are ready to lead. I see this as an opportunity to break down barriers.”
Coventry is believed to be Bach’s favourite but insisted he has been fair to all candidates. The 2004 and 2008 swimming gold medallist is seen as the candidate who would continue in the way Bach did.
But she is not without controversy as Zimbabwe’s sports minister, has not really sharpened her profile in the IOC executive board, and it remains unclear whether members consider her strong enough to steer the IOC in the current geopolitical climate.
Samaranch as compromise
For those who feel that Coventry may not be up to the task and Coe’s reform plans go too far, voting for Samaranch could be a compromise.
The 65-year-old is well-connected in the Olympic Movement but does not want to be compared with his father, who led the IOC 1980-2001, started the commercialisation of the Games but also represented the dark IOC era culminating in the bribes for votes scandal around Salt Lake City’s bid for the 2002 Winter Games.
“I want to show that I can lead the IOC with a modern vision which suits the present, without having to be measured by the legacy of my father,” Samaranch has said.
Four outsiders
The other four candidates are seen as outsiders.
Frenchman David Lappartient has had a steep career but the president of the ruling cycling body UCI has not been an IOC member for a long time.
Johan Eliasch is controversial as president of the ski and snowboard body FIS, and al-Hussein has so far left no lasting impression.
World gymnastics supremo Morinari Watanabe of Japan made headlines with the radical proposal to stage Olympic Games on all continents at the same time to assure around the clock broadcasting, but also remains on outsider.
GNA