Olympics: IOC may face revolt over boxing vote

IOC members are angry at voting a sport off the Olympic programme.

PARIS: Wrestling may be facing a bleak time as regards its Olympic future but it could have the last laugh at the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Session in September in Buenos Aires.

IOC members were already angry that such an important issue as voting a sport off the Olympic programme should be decided initially by the 15-member Executive Board.

Now that anger, mixed with the backlash over the expulsion of wrestling – one of the few sports to have crossed over from the Ancient Games to Pierre de Coubertin’s modern version – could boil over at the Congress from September 7-10.

It could also cast a shadow over the climax of IOC President Jacques Rogge’s 12-year term, but it’s a scenario that some members believe was entirely avoidable.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 15^th, 2013.