Olympic Boxing Fed Moves In New Direction

(ATR) An extraordinary meeting for AIBA will review possible mismanagement and wrongdoing by suspended president C.K. Wu. The meeting of the federation executive committee has been set for Nov. 3-4 in Dubai.

Senior vice president Franco Falcinelli will preside over the meeting, taking over from Wu, who was suspended earlier this month. Members of the EC are concerned that under Wu’s leadership the financial situation of the Olympic boxing federation is in peril due to a large loan and other transactions.

While Wu has filed an appeal of the suspension by the AIBA Disciplinary Commission to a Swiss court, there appears to be little precedent for such an appeal to succeed. AIBA statutes say that rulings of the commission are not subject to appeal.

Since a stormy meeting of the EC held in late July, Wu has resisted efforts to step aside to let Falcinelli and the EC take control of the Olympic boxing federation. After rejecting statute-complying moves by the EC to call meetings, a complaint against Wu was filed to the Disciplinary Commission that led to his suspension.

Falcinelli this week dismissed AIBA legal counsel Ricardo Contreras, the Mexico Boxing Federation president, a Wu ally. Also dismissed is CPV, the Lausanne law firm retained by AIBA. Another firm, Libra, based in the Maison Du Sport International where AIBA and other federations are headquartered, is now counsel of record.

The agenda for the November EC meeting will cover new finance guidelines, legal cases, commercial agreements, amendments of Bylaws and plans to hold the upcoming Extraordinary Congress, planned for Dubai in January.

"However, most importantly, the EC will also discuss recent findings on mismanagement and wrongdoings by the suspended President Wu to take any further action on these matters," says an AIBA press release.

"President Wu had made important commercial agreements and taken key decisions without the EC’s approvals. He had signed and taken on several loans (i) without providing any information to the Executive Committee, (ii) without any reference to this in the financial reports that have been provided these last years to the EC, and (iii) without any feasible plan of reimbursement," says the release.

"By doing this, Wu had not only accumulated CHF 15 million of debt on behalf of AIBA, which was not reported to its members which was a violation of the Swiss Law, without any management or commercial reasons, and failed to get international auditors KPMG to sign off on AIBA accounts for 2016 - 2017, but he had led AIBA to the verge of bankruptcy," says the statement.

"At the November meeting, AIBA’s Executive Committee will look at ways to stabilize AIBA’s financial situation and consider plans to restore the organization back to health if it is possible," concludes the release.

Wu, serving the final year of his third term as AIBA President, has blamed previous AIBA Executive Directors for the difficulties faced by the federation. Wu, an IOC member since 1988, holds a seat on the IOC Executive Board on behalf of the Association of Summer Olympic International Federations. It is not clear yet whether his suspension as AIBA president will disqualify him from the IOC board.

Written by Ed Hula

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