The fate of the 2020 Summer Games is perhaps being played out (a little) today and tomorrow, in Lausanne, in the cozy lounges of an elegant mansion. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) is studying the appeal by Japanese Koji Murofushi, and his national Olympic committee, against the IOC's decision to invalidate the election of the hammer thrower to the Athletes' Commission.
Recall of facts. At the London Games last summer, the name of Koji Murofushi, Olympic hammer champion in 2004 and bronze medalist eight years later, came out of the polls among the four candidates called to represent athletes within the IOC. With him, the vote organized within the village designates the Slovak fencer Danka Bartekova, the Australian rower James Tomkins and the Taiwanese Mu-Yen Chu, specialist in taekwondo. But, on the very day of the election results, the IOC decided to temporarily suspend the results. Reason: two of the elected officials, Koji Murofushi and Mu-Yen Chu, allegedly campaigned to obtain the votes of their peers. An initiative prohibited by Olympic regulations.
The two “culprits” are therefore excluded. A decision which suits the next two in the list of candidates having obtained the greatest number of votes: the swimmer from Zimbabwe, Kirsty Coventry, and the three-time Olympic canoe champion, the Frenchman Tony Estanguet.
Unsurprisingly, Mu-Yen Chu and Koji Murofushi appealed their exclusion to the CAS. The first hearing yielded nothing. Last March, experts at the Swiss court rejected his request. A verdict which ensures Kirsty Coventry a place on the IOC Athletes' Commission. Bis repetitae for the second? We can imagine it. The two Asians are in fact accused of the same offense, having tried to win votes by campaigning. But Tony Estanguet, the first to be affected by the CAS decision, is not declaring victory too soon. “The Japanese Olympic committee seems to me to be better equipped than that of Taiwan,” he told FrancsJeux. I would be careful not to think that the CAS verdict will necessarily be identical. »
Above all, the issue is not the same. By forcing the IOC to reverse its decision and accept Koji Murofushi among its members, Japan would see its influence grow within the Olympic institution. An influence today limited, the Asian giant having only one representative at the IOC, Tsunekazu Takeda. A few months before the vote for the designation of the host city of the 2020 Games, where Tokyo is in competition with Istanbul and Madrid, the CAS decision promises to be decisive.
