It’s official: Jean-Michel Saive is a candidate for president of the Belgian Olympic and Interfederal Committee (COIB). The former table tennis player, ex-world number 1 and seven times selected for the Games, himself announced a candidacy presented for several months as an open secret. “ This candidacy for the presidency of the COIB is really in line with my career within the Olympic body, he explained. It started in 2000 when I joined the Athletes' Commission. In 2009, I became a director, and in 2017, I was named vice-president. I am also in the company of Tom Van Damme, current president of the cycling federation. » At 50, Jean-Michel Saive is the first to declare himself. He could even remain the only one until the election, scheduled for next September after the Tokyo Games. The current president of the COIB, Pierre-Olivier Beckers, also a member of the IOC (and president of the coordination commission for the Paris 2024 Games), will return his seat at the end of his fourth mandate. The new statutes of the Belgian Olympic body do not allow him to represent himself again.
