Boxers did not knock out a confession – Newspaper Kommersant No. 228 (7429) of 12/08/2022

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) upheld the decision to suspend recognition of the International Boxing Association (IBA), headed by Russian Umar Kremlev. The IOC decision notes that the IBA has still not met the requirements of the leadership of the Olympic movement regarding the management of the federation – both administrative and financial. The IOC has made it clear that maintaining the status quo could result in boxing not being included in the program for the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles. Recallthat in Paris 2024, as it was in Tokyo 2020, the IBA will be suspended from the Olympic tournament. Instead, the IOC will host the boxing competitions on its own.

The International Olympic Committee has not reconsidered its decision to withdraw IBA recognition. As IOC sports director Keith McConnell noted after the IOC executive committee meeting ended on Tuesday evening, the IBA has not complied with the requirements of the leadership of the Olympic movement, insisting on reform of the IBA management. It should cover both administrative and financial aspects, as well as purely sports related, for example, refereeing fights.

Mr. McConnell also said that the IOC sent a letter to the IBA President Umar Kremlev, in which he explained what exactly did not suit the IOC.

“The letter expresses our concerns about management and financial processes. The change in management culture that was required to lift the IBA suspension never happened. Accordingly, the suspension remains in effect,” Mr. McConnell told reporters.

The IOC, however, did not limit itself to stating that it was not satisfied with the work of the IBA – such statements have been issued by the structure in recent years. McConnell’s statement hints that boxing may even be excluded from the Olympic program. Recallthat at the Tokyo 2020 Games (held last year), the boxing tournament was already held without the participation of the IBA – it was hosted by the IOC itself. The same scheme will be used in Paris in 2024.

The IOC explained that the criteria for selecting participants for the Paris Games will be almost the same as for the Tokyo Olympics.

The real difficulties may arise in 2028, when Los Angeles will host the Olympics. Keith McConnell recalled that at the moment boxing does not appear at all in the preliminary program of the 2028 Games (since 1904, when boxing debuted at the Olympics, not a single Games could do without it). “And if the decision had to be made now, then the IOC Council would not be able to recommend the IOC session to include boxing in the Games program under the leadership of the IBA, as it did not demonstrate a successful solution to the existing problems,” Mr. McConnell said.

Recallthat the IBA has been in crisis for several years now. Actually, on its wave in 2019, the IOC withdrew the recognition of the IBA. The federation experienced difficulties with both management and finances – IBA debts at some point exceeded $15 million. However, in 2020, after Umar Kremlev headed the IBA, the situation began to improve. In particular, the issue of debts was resolved. This happened after Gazprom became the sponsor of the IBA, the contract with which provided the IBA with revenues of about 30 million Swiss francs.

But relations between the IBA and the IOC have not improved. Rather, they even escalated. In May, Umar Kremlev was re-elected to the presidency, but the IOC actually refused to recognize the results of the elections in Istanbul, to which the Dutchman Boris van der First, who tried to compete with Umar Kremlev, was not allowed. The latter appealed his dismissal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), achieved a positive decision for himself, but in the end, the IBA congress overwhelmingly voted against holding new elections, thus giving a huge credit of confidence to Mr. Kremlev.

Already in October, the IBA made two more decisions that also did not arouse understanding in the IOC. Yes, the International Boxing Association canceled the earlier ban on participation in international competitions of Russian and Belarusian athletes (the recommendations of the IOC, drawn up after the start of events in Ukraine, provide that Russians and Belarusians should not compete in international tournaments). At the same time, we are talking about performances not in a neutral status, but under their national flags. And the IBA temporarily suspended the membership of the Boxing Federation of Ukraine (FBU) – for “state interference” in the work of the FBU.

Alexander Petrov