Grave Reality Sets In on IOC’s Dream Setup

LAUSANNE, Switzerland —  The International Olympic Committee returns to the Palais de Beaulieau today for an extraordinary session to address a scandal that threatens not only its role as the guardian of the five rings but the future of the Olympic Games.

For anyone who was here for the IOC’s annual session 13 years ago, it should come as no shock that this day of reckoning has arrived.

It might seem like ancient history now, but it was only two decades ago--after the tragedy of Munich and the financial disaster of Montreal--that the IOC virtually had to pay cities to become Olympic hosts.

That all changed when Peter Ueberroth designed a model for squeezing money from sponsors that resulted in a $225-million profit for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

By the time IOC members gathered in Lausanne in 1986 to choose the sites for the 1992 Winter and Summer Games, there were 13 candidate cities. All set up booths outside the conference room where the session was in order, turning the halls of the Palais de Beaulieau into a carnival midway.

Anything was possible for IOC members behind those doors. Dinner with Gina Lollobrigida? See the people from Cortina, Italy. A private viewing of rare, early Picassos? See the people from Barcelona. An audience with Queen Silvia of Sweden? See the people from Falun. A Bulgarian schnapps? See the people from Sofia.

Those were the obvious inducements. Stories of lavish gifts presented by hopeful bid cities to IOC members in private were rampant.

Finally, one of the IOC’s elders, Reggie Alexander of Kenya, had seen and heard too much. He took the floor during one of the meetings and scolded his colleagues, recounting his dream from the night before.

“In my dream, I went to the grave site of [modern Olympics founder] Baron de Coubertin and there, I had a vision,” he said. “The grave opened up before my eyes, de Coubertin’s hand reached out, grasped the Olympic rings and pulled them down into the ground. Then the baron said to me, ‘You can have these back only after you have stopped misbehaving yourselves.’ ”

The IOC was embarrassed, at least publicly, and passed strict rules in subsequent years restricting the value of gifts members could receive, first to $200 and then to $150.

Privately, however, many IOC members ignored the rules, and many of those who didn’t ignored the rule breakers. That is the reason the IOC has returned to the scene of its earlier crimes, to confront the fallout from a $1-million bribery scandal that grew out of Salt Lake City’s successful bid for the 2002 Winter Games.

The irony, Anita DeFrantz, one of two IOC members from the United States, said Tuesday, is that Salt Lake City didn’t have to buy a single vote to win the IOC’s approval in 1995. It clearly was the most capable candidate.

But their bidders apparently engaged in bribery because they believed that’s the way business is done with the IOC. In various investigations of Salt Lake City and other candidates throughout the world, there hasn’t been much evidence presented that proves them wrong. Thirty-four IOC members have been implicated, four of whom have resigned.

So the IOC is here this week to consider further reforms, sweeping change that, according to executive board member Kevan Gosper of Australia, will create a new IOC for the new millennium.

First, however, there is the ugly business of punishing the worst offenders. The IOC will vote today on the expulsion of six members.

There is strong sentiment among many IOC members, including some of most powerful, to add a seventh member to that list, although it is unlikely that enough evidence can be uncovered in time to expel executive board member Kim Un Young of South Korea during today’s meeting.

There also is mounting pressure on another member, Phil Coles of Australia, to resign.

“No way, mate,” he said Tuesday, digging in.

The lobby of the elegant Palais hotel, where most IOC members are staying, was not a cheerful place as members met in small groups and discussed the possibilities, including rumors of an insurrection against President Juan Antonio Samaranch.

“There are 1,000 plots and 5,000 rumors,” said Francois Carrard, the IOC’s director general, dismissing all of them. “By tomorrow morning, there will be 5,000 plots and 10,000 rumors.”

Amid the Palais intrigue, the need for serious reform seemed forgotten.

But Jim Easton, the other U.S. member, said it is absolutely essential that the IOC adopt meaningful reforms. If he’s not convinced his colleagues are moving in that direction by the end of this week, he said he would consider resigning.

“I would have some reservations about continuing and also about the future of the movement,” he said.

It appears as if Reggie Alexander’s dream is coming true. The IOC is sinking into de Coubertin’s grave, one member at a time.

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Randy Harvey can be reached at his e-mail address: [email protected].