There should not have been any suspense. There was none. Meeting for three days in Lausanne, the IOC Executive Board gave the green light on Wednesday June 12 to the two candidacies competing for the Winter Games in 2030 and 2034. The French Alps will be proposed for final validation at the session of the instance, on July 24 in Paris. They will inherit the first of the two editions. Salt Lake City will experience the same scenario, but for the Winter Games in 2034.
With this decision by the executive board, the two applications have taken a further step. It promised to be without great danger, the IOC no longer really having any maneuvering steps, at least for the Games in 2030. It now remains for the French and the Americans to go through the last level of the building, the vote of the session. A formality, too, the members of the body not having the habit of standing as one man in the face of the decisions of their “government”.
For Salt Lake City, the race has already been won. Utah's capital checks all the boxes. Its application file, a 78-page document revealed to the media at the beginning of the week, does not present any gray areas or unanswered questions. Budget, dates, legacy, public support… It’s all there. The job is done.
For the French Alps, on the other hand, one piece is still missing from the bid book. It is not trivial, since it concerns State guarantees. The candidacy team was unable to obtain it before the European elections of June 9, with state services reluctant to validate a draft budget that they considered undervalued. The dissolution of the National Assembly, announced last Sunday by Emmanuel Macron, adds an element of uncertainty.
Who will sign the guarantees? At what moment ? Difficult to answer before the legislative elections, scheduled for June 30 and July 7, and the subsequent formation of a new government. But the IOC Executive Board chose not to wait. On Wednesday June 12, it recommended to the session to elect the French Alps for the 2030 Winter Games.
The French team will still have to attach the State guarantees to the file. It is not exempt. But the Olympic body grants him a delay, justified by the improbable political situation born from the victory of the Rassemblement national party in the European elections.
The IOC explains it: “The current political situation in France did not allow the documents to be finalized before the decision of the executive commission. Therefore, today's decision (Wednesday June 12) by the Executive Commission concerning the French Alps 2030 project is subject to the submission of the following elements, in accordance with the requirements of the IOC, before the next session: submission of the guarantee of delivery of the Games by the French government; confirmation of a partnership contribution to the Games organization budget from the two regions Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur and the French State. »
Karl Stoss, the president of the future host commission, was confident at a press conference. “We are confident that both guarantees will arrive before the IOC session, he said. We are in close contact with the government and the two presidents of the two regions, as well as with the president of the National Olympic Committee. They told us: “Look, our situation is that the elections will take place at the end of June and then on July 7. After that, but before the IOC session in Paris, we will get this confirmation on the guarantees."
For David Lappartient, the president of the CNOSF, and the other project leaders – Marie-Amélie Le Fur for the national Paralympic committee, Laurent Wauquiez for the AURA region, Renaud Muselier for the PACA region – the time has not yet come to get agitated. Soliciting the current Prime Minister, Gabriel Attal, would be useless, his possible signature no longer having any value. They must wait to know his successor.
But, whatever his identity and political color, it seems difficult to imagine that the new head of government would begin his mandate with a refusal to support the Olympic project.
