AFP Greg MARTIN / OIS / IOC
German Thomas Bach was re-elected president of the International Olympic Committee today, Wednesday, by acclamation, for a second term of four years, a few months before the start of the Tokyo Summer Olympics.
Bach, who took office in 2013, received 93 votes against one vote against and four other members abstaining from voting from the International Committee, at the 137th General Assembly previously scheduled in Athens before his transfer to Lausanne via video.
Olympic champion Thomas Bach has been re-elected for an additional four-year term as President of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
Olympics (@Olympics) March 10, 2021
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“Tokyo remains the best-prepared host city in the history of the Olympic Games, and at the present time we have no reason to doubt that the opening ceremony will actually take place on July 23,” the 67-year-old German said during the opening of the General Assembly.
And this surprising formula can be explained less than five months before the start of the Games, through the fears that still swirl around the major Olympic event, which was postponed for a year due to the “Covid-19” virus.
“The question is not whether the Games will take place, but how?” Bach added.
The German, who found himself obliged to persuade in all his media statements that the Olympic Games will not turn into a huge source of infection, stressed that it would be a “safe demonstration of peace, solidarity and the resilience of mankind in the face of the epidemic.”
Bach also warned that these games would involve “sacrifices”: In addition to many health precautions, the Olympic world remains commenting on the decisions of the Japanese authorities regarding the attendance of foreign spectators, before the end of this March, and about the public attendance in general by the end of next April.
Before the renewal of confidence in the president of the International Olympic Committee until 2025, the 103 members of the committee evaluated the results of the 2020 agenda, the Bach roadmap adopted after his arrival in the first term in 2013 and in which 85% of its proposals have been implemented.
Source: “AFP”
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