Boxing was not taken into share – Tokyo-2020 – Kommersant

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has distributed the proceeds from the Tokyo Summer Olympics, postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic from summer 2020 to summer 2021, among the participating sports federations. The leaders in terms of the amount of subsidies have traditionally been the structures that oversee athletics, gymnastics and swimming, which, in accordance with key indicators, are the largest and most significant. The outsiders are still the federations responsible for modern pentathlon, golf and rugby. The most difficult is the situation around the International Boxing Association (IBA). The IOC, which suspended the IBA from the Olympic tournament at the 2020 Games due to a management crisis, withheld a payment of $ 17 million intended for it, and whether it will be able to receive this money is still a big question.

Insidethegames published a table containing information on the distribution of the IOC income from the Tokyo Olympics between international federations. It follows from it that the International Olympic Committee allocated $540 million for the development and support of 28 structures – exactly the same amount as after the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro.

When distributing subsidies, the IOC, as usual, proceeded from the principle that the largest and most significant federations for the Olympics receive more.

For this reason, the International Association of Athletics Federations (World Athletics), the International Federation of Aquatics (FINA) and the International Gymnastics Federation (FIG), whose accounts received more than $100 million in total after the Tokyo Games, are subsidized much more generously than the International Union of Modern Pentathlon (UIPM), International Golf Federation (IGF). The last IOC paid $13 million each.

There are structures that, it seems, will remain without subsidies at all. So, in the table, which was at the disposal of Insidethegames, the federations that control baseball, karate, sport climbing, surfing and softball are not mentioned. And opposite the International Boxing Association, which nevertheless got into the list, there are two stars. It is specified below that its share – $ 17 million – will be retained by the International Olympic Committee.

This is due to a long-standing conflict between the two organizations. It began at the end of the last decade and did not come to naught, after in 2020 the post of president of the association, which was in deep crisis and deprived of recognition as the head sports structure, was taken by the Russian Umar Kremlev. The contradictions escalated after the re-election of Mr. Kremlev to the post of head of the association in May this year. 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 Kremlin, was not allowed.

Against the backdrop of existing controversy, the IOC suspended the IBA from hosting the Olympic tournament at the Tokyo Olympics and assumed these obligations, and then again excommunicated the federation from control of the Olympic qualification and the Olympic boxing tournament – now as part of the 2024 Olympics in Paris. In addition, boxing has not yet been included in the program of the Games following it. They will take place in 2028 in Los Angeles.

Ekaterina Remizova