President Schrödinger – Sport – Kommersant

The International Chess Federation (FIDE) – one of the oldest sports organizations – is faced with an unprecedented case. She found that her history had one more president than is commonly believed—not seven, but eight.

Federation Historical Committee spent investigation and found that in 1939, in connection with the outbreak of World War II in Europe, the FIDE General Assembly considered it expedient to move its headquarters to another continent and elect a new president.

The place of the Dutchman Alexander Rueb was taken by the head of the Argentine federation, Augusto de Muro. The Argentine was the president of FIDE until 1946, when the next chess congress took place. However, this fact, for unknown reasons, was forgotten and surfaced only 80 years later. The question of how many leaders FIDE actually had was one of the items on the agenda of the September congress of the International Chess Federation.

Until recently, it was believed that during the existence of FIDE, that is, since 1924, it was headed by seven people – the Dutch Alexander Rueb and Max Euwe, the Swede Folke Rogard, the Icelander Fridrik Olafsson, the Filipino Florencio Campomanes, as well as the Russians Kirsan Ilyumzhinov and Arkady Dvorkovich.

These names appeared both on the official website of the federation and on other resources. However, according to another version, which FIDE instructed the historical committee to check, the list should not have seven, but eight names.

And this version was confirmed as a result. Augusto de Muro should be considered the eighth (and chronologically second) head of the federation. Little is known about him: for a long time he led the Argentine Chess Federation, and also headed the organizing committee of the eighth World Chess Olympiad, held in September 1939 in Buenos Aires.

It was at its end that Mr. de Muro received presidential powers. The fact is that at the same time as the Olympics, the Second World War began on the European continent. For this reason, at the FIDE congress, which took place after the Olympiad, the representative of Paraguay (his name is unknown) came up with the idea of ​​moving the headquarters of the organization from The Hague to the territory of another continent – just South America, and also to elect a new head of the federation. This position was then held by Alexander Rueb from the Netherlands, the first president of FIDE.

Congress delegates agreed with their Paraguayan colleague and voted for the candidacy of Augusto de Muro. This procedure, according to the historical committee of the federation, was legitimate and fully consistent with the charter of the organization. Mr. de Muro served as president until the next congress, which took place only in 1946.

His name, however, did not enter FIDE history. It is still unclear whether he will officially be considered the second head of the structure. The final decision on this matter, the Federation Council, taking into account the results of the investigation of the historical committee, will be made “not earlier than January 2023.”

Ekaterina Remizova