IOC Presidential Elections Set for March 20 – Seven Candidates Competing

Tomorrow, a new head of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) will be elected at the luxurious Greek resort of Costa Navarino. Thomas Bach will officially step down, but for some time, he will still de facto influence the decisions of the main Olympic organization in the world. His successor will be chosen from among seven candidates through a secret ballot.

The future head of the IOC will need to lift sports from the ruins to which various political manipulations around the world have sent it recently. There are signs of recovery, but many honest Belarusian and Russian athletes have suffered under the repressive actions of the IOC and several sports organizations.

Thomas Bach sought to please several radical countries that consider themselves the "elite." One of the representatives of such states,  Sebastian Coe, is a candidate to replace Bach. The problem is that out of the seven potential successors to the Olympic throne, Coe, the head of World Athletics, is known for his animosity toward Russia and Belarus.

Ivan Tikhon, the Chairman of the Belarusian Athletics Federation, stated: “You always see double and triple standards at play. One thing is said, something completely different is done, and a third action is realized.”

A week ago, the head of the International Gymnastics Federation, Japanese Morinari Watanabe, visited Moscow, warmly greeting almost everyone. He shook hands and jested with Olympic champion Nikita Nagorny. For several countries, this seemed like a challenge, I think you understand. He smiled a lot, adopting a diplomatic stance.

However, I personally find it hard to forget how cruelly our remarkable gymnast Alina Gornosko was treated ahead of the Paris Olympics, deprived of any chance to compete for a fair qualification spot for her dream games, especially considering what Paris has turned into. Watanabe could have influenced a fair participation for Gornosko in those games, but he did not.

An interesting candidate is Swedish multimillionaire Johan Eliasch, who leads the International Ski and Snowboard Federation. He surprisingly advocated for the return of Belarusian and Russian athletes, and it's worth noting that he did this just ahead of the IOC chair election. He deserves applause since Scandinavian leaders of the International Biathlon Union have acted like Nazis toward our outstanding athletes, while Eliasch appears to be quite the opposite—such a soft radical.

Alexander Grebnev, chairman of the Belarusian Ski Union, commented: “There is, so to speak, a general trend and tendency for the overdue return of Belarusian and Russian athletes to international sporting arenas. There seems to be an understanding that the ostracism was utterly unjustified.”

There are still four eager candidates who want to lead sports on the planet. The youngest is multi-time Olympic swimming champion Kirsty Coventry from Zimbabwe. They say she is particularly lobbied by Thomas Bach. Current IOC Vice President Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr., son of the great leader of world Olympism, seems to have been for us at one point but then was supposedly against us. Head of international cycling, David Lapatin, and Prince Faisal al-Hussein of Jordan are among those who allegedly want us back. However, the question remains: what is happening at the top of the global agenda?