The International Olympic Committee has today (Friday) put forward eight names for election as IOC members, with International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) president Sebastian Coe and Fifa counterpart Gianni Infantino not named.
The list is the result of the first targeted recruitment process for IOC membership as outlined in Agenda 2020, the IOC’s strategic roadmap for the future of the Olympic Movement. A new set of criteria was applied by the IOC Members Election Commission, chaired by HRH the Princess Royal, which proposed the list of candidates to the IOC’s Executive Board.
The IOC said the proposed candidatures represent a cross-section of expertise from the worlds of sport, culture, medicine, sociology, business, law and management. Gender equality is guaranteed with four women and four men on the list.
The eight proposed members include South African film producer Anat Singh; Italian Ivo Ferriani, president of the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation; former Finnish racewalker and politician Sari Essayah; Nita Ambani, founder and chair of the Reliance Foundation and owner of Indian Premier League cricket franchise the Mumbai Indians; and Canadian Olympic Committee president Tricia Smith.
Colombia’s Luis Moreno, president of the Inter-American Development Bank; Auvita Rapilla, secretary general of the Papua New Guinea Olympic Committee; and Karl Stoss, chairman of the managing board of Casinos Austria and president of the Austrian Olympic Committee, have also been put forward.
While IOC membership for the leaders of Fifa and the IAAF is not automatic, Coe and Infantino’s predecessors at the helm of two of the largest sports federations have held seats at the IOC for decades.
“These eight candidates that we are proposing to the next IOC Session are a strong and varied group of individuals that are experts in their respective fields and will make great contributions,” IOC president Thomas Bach (pictured) said. “They have been vetted by new criteria in keeping with the recommendations of Olympic Agenda 2020. These candidates will add extra strength and diversity to our already universal orchestra of IOC Members.”
The new members, if approved by August’s Session in Rio de Janeiro, would bring the total IOC membership to 99.