A massive blow to Hamburg. This Monday morning, the German city's bid team woke up with the painful feeling of having been knocked out. On Sunday, November 29, a majority of the local population voted “No” in the referendum on the Olympic project. The opponents won, with 51,6%, against 48,4% for “Yes”. A score that the easy victory of the Olympic pros (65,57%) in the port of Kiel, where the sailing events would have taken place, was not enough to reverse. The gap is small, the result remained undecided until the end. But the no vote in the referendum definitively condemns the German candidacy for the Summer Games in 2024.

Does the withdrawal of Hamburg benefit the other candidates, Budapest, Los Angeles, Paris and Rome? No. Certainly, the result of the referendum excludes from the race a candidate who could, thanks to his ideas, his means and an attractive project, play an interesting, even major, role in the campaign. But the German no, the second in less than three years after that of Munich for the Winter Games in 2022, marks a defeat for the IOC, for its president and more broadly for the Olympic movement. A defeat which, in the medium term, will benefit no one.

Above all, the German failure reveals with a certain violence that the resolutions of Agenda 2020, adopted by the IOC last December in Monaco in order to make the Games more accessible and less expensive, have not yet convinced the general public. In Germany no more, probably, than in the rest of the world. Today, it is not certain that the same referendum would have a different result in Budapest, Los Angeles, Paris or Rome.

In Hamburg, Mayor Olaf Scholz made official at 21 p.m. on Sunday evening the result of the vote and the abandonment of the Olympic project. Thirty minutes later, the general director of the bid, Nikolas Hill, answered questions from some foreign media by telephone.

FrancsJeux: What is your feeling after the “No” victory in the Olympic referendum?

Nicholas Hill: We are obviously very disappointed. The entire team had shown great enthusiasm since the start of the project. For all of us, this is a difficult pill to swallow. But a democratic decision must be accepted. We said, from the start, that our candidacy only made sense if it was supported and accompanied by the population.

How do you explain this result?

We have seen the debate around the issue of the 2024 Games evolve over the past few weeks in a direction that did not seem favorable. Several subjects which were not directly linked to the Olympic Games in 2024 were invited into the debate: the controversy over the role of the German Football Federation (DFB) in the awarding of the World Cup in 2006, the terrorist attacks in Paris, the refugee crisis... These external issues ended up weighing on the population's choice.

However, the German Olympic Committee (DOSB) had cited, in recent weeks, an opinion poll where “Yes” won with 71%…

That's correct, but this survey was carried out among the German population, not only in Hamburg and Kiel.

How do you explain the difference between the result in Kiel, where more than 65% of voters opted for "Yes", and that recorded in Hamburg?

In Kiel, people have already experienced the Olympic Games (the city hosted the sailing events of the Munich Olympics in 1972, editor's note), they have very strong memories of it. They wanted to relive this experience. In Hamburg, this was not the case.

Is there a possibility today of still saving this candidacy?

No. The result of the referendum definitively condemns it.

What would you like to say to Thomas Bach, the IOC President?

I would like to tell him to continue to push forward the resolutions of Agenda 2020. This process of reforms can help strengthen the future of the Olympic movement. The wheel is turning in the right direction.

After Munich 2022, a second referendum condemns a German candidacy. What does this mean for German sport?

The situation of Munich 2022 is not comparable to that of Hamburg 2024. But it is certain that it will not be easy, in the future, to build a new Olympic project in Germany.