Moscow: a losing option from the start
Choosing the best option from the five available was not easy. After all, the 2012 Games were contested not just by cities, but by iconic cities, true metropolises - London, Madrid, Moscow, New York and Paris. One can only sympathize with the jury and the special commission that assessed the candidates' readiness. And also with the voting IOC members.
There were many versions about favorites and outsiders throughout the pre-election period. Most experts considered Moscow the most hopeless option and predicted its elimination from the race already in the first or (at most) second round of voting. In principle, that is what happened, but the Muscovites, whose delegation was headed by the mayor of the Russian capital Yuri Luzhkov, looked very dignified. And 15 votes is not such a bad indicator. London in the same first round got only seven more.
Vice-mayor of Moscow Valery Shantsev, who was the chairman of the Russian bid committee, was upset after the voting procedure, but stated that he was not going to give up: 'We will seriously analyze and think about how to fight for the invitation of the Olympics to Moscow in the coming years. The fact that we dropped out of the race in the very first round, of course, upset us. However, it was not an election of a candidate city, but a choice of the first among equals: never before had such a "group of death" gathered in the final.'
High-ranking Russian officials claim that all sports facilities that were planned for the 2012 Olympics will be built. And the Speaker of the State Duma Boris Gryzlov said that Russian cities should continue to fight for the right to host the Olympic Games: 'It is necessary to set the task of finally achieving the Olympics - no matter summer or winter - to be held in one of the Russian cities.'
Honestly, Russia cannot realistically count on hosting the next Summer Games. Europe got its Olympics, and now preference will be given to representatives of other continents. Experts say that European cities can at best count on 2020. But in winter sports, Russians may well compete for the title of Olympic capital already in 2014.
New York: no place found for the stadium
By the way, it was in this alternation of continents that some forecasters saw an additional chance for New York. They reasoned that if the Americans managed to pass the first and second rounds, then representatives of European cities eliminated from the race might give their votes to New York simply to ensure the 2012 Games did not go to Europe and to hope for a rematch for the 2016 Olympics. For example, if Madrid were eliminated immediately, it would be more advantageous for them to support a North American city rather than Paris or London.
But such logic did not bear fruit. New York did pass the first round, but in the second round it received even fewer votes than before - 18 against 19. And, naturally, it dropped out of the race. In principle, this was to be expected, since the Americans had serious problems finding a site for the main Olympic stadium. Forecasters argued that if New York did not solve this problem before the vote, then it had no chance in the ballot. That is exactly what happened. Although representatives of the city's bid committee fought to the last bullet and even brought to Singapore as a kind of 'ambassadors of peace' the legendary boxer Muhammad Ali, as well as the wife of the former US president, and now a senator from the state whose center is New York City - Hillary Clinton. In the American support group there were generally many famous athletes living in the States. Among them is the Ukrainian Olympic champion in figure skating in 1994, Oksana Baiul.
Madrid: no zest
Madrid turned out to be the third wheel. Experts claimed that the Spanish bid was quite informative and prudent. But it lacked zest, a certain something. And that is a big minus. And also, of course, the reputation of the Spanish capital was significantly undermined by terrorist attacks. And even the appearance in Singapore of the famous Real Madrid footballer Raul did not help his native city get the Olympic Games. Although it is worth noting that Madrid won the second round of voting, gaining 32 votes (five more than London). But in the third round, the French and English capitals, receiving the votes of New York supporters, overtook the Spaniards in one spurt. But they should hardly be too upset, since 80% of the sports facilities that were planned to be built for the Olympic Games will be put into operation. That is, the people of Madrid, even in defeat, will be able to benefit.
Paris: what "bad luck" means
Paris was considered the favorite of the pre-election race, but in recent years universally recognized favorites regularly suffer fiasco. For example, everyone believed that the 1996 Olympic Games should have been held in Athens (in the year of the 100th anniversary of the modern Games, it would have been logical to give the right to host them to the birthplace of the Olympics). But the victory was celebrated by American Atlanta, which overtook not only Athens, but also Toronto, Melbourne, Manchester and Belgrade.
Four years later, the favorite was Beijing. The Chinese capital kept hope for final success until the last moment, but the victory was celebrated by Australian Sydney, which was also conceded to by Manchester, Berlin and Istanbul.
The 2004 Games, as many thought, should have been held in Rome, but during the voting, Athens unexpectedly took first place (Cape Town, Stockholm and Buenos Aires were also in the running). And only when determining the host of the 2008 Olympic Games was everything decided in a short time. Already in the second round, Beijing received more than half the votes and prematurely removed all questions from the agenda, while Toronto, Paris, Istanbul and Osaka were left empty-handed.
The French capital lost this time, too. Although it seemed that almost all factors were in its favor. France hosted the 1998 World Cup, and the main stadium of the World Cup – the handsome Saint-Denis – was to become the main Olympic venue. Paris, in general, has a large complex of sports facilities of the highest level (although the French would have had to finish building quite a lot) and rich experience in hosting a wide variety of competitions. Moreover, Paris's bid had that very zest that the Madrid bid lacked: the beach volleyball tournament was planned to be held... under the Eiffel Tower.
Why did the French lose? Some noticed that an unethical attack against the Madrid bid was made by Prince Albert of Monaco. With his question about how Spain fights terrorism, he angered the supporters of the Madrid bid. And when the Spanish capital dropped out of the race, they did not want to vote for the French, giving preference to London. You might say it's a trifle? But in such matters there are no trifles.
Corruption scandal
It had long been common practice to involve so-called consultants in cooperation with the bid committee, who compiled detailed dossiers on every IOC member with voting rights. The dossiers included complete lists of the subject's preferences – from sexual to culinary (for example, whether they put sugar in their coffee).
Bidders always want to know for sure which buttons to press during lobbying. If an IOC member loves football, they are sure to be taken to a stadium. If he adores dogs of a certain breed, a puppy is sent to him. There is a story about how, during the decision on the 1992 Olympics, a man who stayed in the same hotel as the IOC members complained to the administration that he could not reach his bed. His room – by mistake – was piled up with gifts from the candidate cities.
However, recently, especially after a series of bribery scandals (especially after Salt Lake City 2002), bidders have been banned from meeting with IOC members. True, if you are sitting in the bar of the hotel where they are staying, and they come down to the bar themselves, without your invitation, and pay for their own drinks themselves, then probably you are not breaking the rules. It would not be surprising if it turned out that such “informal and casual meetings” have increased several-fold in recent years.
BBC journalists decided to test in practice how incorruptible the IOC members, on whom the fate of the 2012 Olympics depended, were. To do this, they, posing as consultants of a nonexistent English consulting company “New London Ventures,” met with one of the IOC members, the Bulgarian professor Ivan Slavkov, who by the very fact of agreeing to the meeting violated the ethical code of the International Olympic Committee, which forbids its members from any contacts with people or organizations lobbying for the holding of the Olympic Games in various cities.
The English journalists, posing as business consultants, said that their firm represented the interests of a group of businessmen from East London interested in holding the Olympic Games specifically in the British capital. The meeting with Ivan Slavkov was filmed with a hidden camera. During the conversation with the imaginary English consultants, Professor Slavkov stated that he was “open to negotiations,” but other IOC members might need other incentives to vote in favor of London. Then the possibility of buying the votes of other IOC members was discussed with him.
In addition, the television film edited by the BBC features negotiations with four sports agents who help various countries win the competitive race to host the Olympic Games. These agents stated that they could secure London the votes of 54 IOC members. One of them, Goran Takach, named the names of 30 members of the International Olympic Committee with whom he could discuss the terms of their support for London, and, according to him, 15 to 20 officials would require payment for this service.
As soon as the content of the film became known, a statement followed from Lord Sebastian Coe – chairman of the official English committee “London-2012” – who distanced himself from the reporters' action, stating that his committee complies with all norms of the IOC ethical code. However, the President of the International Olympic Committee, Jacques Rogge, announced that the IOC Ethics Commission had already begun an investigation into the allegations of potential corruption in the Committee.
On the heels of this, the chairman of the Bulgarian Olympic Committee, Ivan Slavkov, and his Swiss partner of Serbian origin, Goran Takach, held a press conference in Sofia. They denied the BBC's corruption allegations and threatened the journalists with legal prosecution.
Ivan Slavkov is a rather curious character. He is known in Bulgaria by the nickname Batyushka and is a prominent hero of the socialist era. He is one of the few representatives of the former regime who have managed to retain much of their power to this day. Slavkov's star rose in the late 60s, when he married Lyudmila, the daughter of Bulgarian party leader Todor Zhivkov. This marriage secured for Slavkov the post of head of Bulgarian National Television, and then leadership positions in Bulgarian sports. Despite the political changes of recent decades, Ivan Slavkov managed to maintain popularity and influence in sports circles. He long held the posts of chairman of the Bulgarian Olympic Committee and the Bulgarian Football Union.
The corruption scandal that erupted forced Ivan Slavkov, perhaps for the first time, to abandon his usual self-confident behavior before the press. At the press conference, he admitted that, according to his premonitions, this scandal threatened to end his career at the IOC. But at the same time, Slavkov denied the allegations that he had agreed to take a bribe and support London's candidacy to become the host of the 2012 Olympic Games.
The official version of Slavkov is that he was conducting negotiations with fake businessmen in order to expose them. The Bulgarian press notes that Slavkov was pale and behaved uncertainly. He stated that lawyers advised him not to comment on the controversial topic.
And Goran Takach, a Swiss citizen who is also linked to the scandal, threatened journalists with a lawsuit, claiming that they had used forged documents and passed themselves off as representatives of a non-existent company: "If they recorded our meeting, that is completely illegal. It is very sad that the BBC uses such methods. Such journalism should get what it deserves."
Curiously, this time too there were suspicions. If not of fraud, then of a breach of ethics. The matter concerns meetings between the Prime Minister of England, Tony Blair, who had specially arrived in Singapore, with a number of IOC members. No one reports what the conversations were about, citing the illegality of such meetings.
First among equals
However, all this is already in the past. London got the Olympic Games after a very large preparatory effort. In the process of "seduction" of IOC members, a very active role was played by the chairman of the bid committee, Lord Sebastian Coe (former athlete, Olympic champion in Moscow and Los Angeles, who made a brilliant political career), Queen Elizabeth, Princess Anne, the already mentioned British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Mayor of London Ken Livingstone, as well as well-known athletes, among them David Beckham and Bobby Charlton. Beckham arrived in Singapore with his wife Victoria and even took part in an exhibition show with a ball. True, not a football, but a basketball.
It is noteworthy that Lord Coe, several months before the vote, quite seriously claimed that London could compete with Paris: "Those who constantly and attentively observe what is happening believe that in the last few months we have significantly closed the gap." Coe introduced members of the inspection team that visited the candidate cities to the most significant sports venues of the British capital - the new Wembley Stadium, the Wimbledon tennis courts and the Horse Guards Parade in the very center of the city, where it is planned to hold competitions... in beach volleyball.
However, many famous London landmarks will be used: in Hyde Park it is planned to hold competitions in eventing and cycling, in Regent's Park - basketball and softball. By the way, Horse Guards Parade is located right opposite the windows of the Prime Minister's office at 10 Downing Street. And the planned beach volleyball competitions prompted Tony Blair to joke: "This is a very clever move on the part of the organizers - to place beach volleyball opposite the windows of the prime minister. It guarantees the full attention and participation of anyone who will be prime minister then."
Now, knowing the result of the vote, it is interesting to look back to May 2003, when the British government announced that it would support London's bid to host the 2012 Olympic Games. Then, after several months of behind-the-scenes discussions, the Minister for Culture, Media and Sport, Tessa Jowell, announced that the government would make every effort to bring the Olympics to the British capital - for the first time since 1948. Jowell said then that the cost of holding the Games in the amount of 2.37 billion pounds sterling (about $4.3 billion) would be covered mainly by organizing a special Olympic lottery and increasing the local housing tax for residents of the capital by 20 pounds a year.
Experts at the time claimed that Londoners would have to create the entire Olympic infrastructure from scratch. In the east of the city, an Olympic stadium and an Olympic village would need to be built, and the capital's transport system, famous for its unpredictability and lack of punctuality, would need to be put in order. Opponents of holding the Games, of whom there are quite a few in the British capital, believe that the creation of specialized facilities will not help London and its eastern outskirts, which lag behind the rest of the capital. However, Jowell stated: "The Olympics is not just the most spectacular show on Earth. It will help revive East London." The Mayor of the capital, Ken Livingstone, echoes the minister: "The Olympics will be held in one of the most neglected and poorest areas today, which has been languishing since the London port and industry left it."
It is also worth noting that Londoners promised all participants of the 2012 Olympic Games a number of benefits. This is a multi-million project under which all sports delegations will be sent home at the expense of the organizers. All residents of the Olympic village will be able to call free of charge to a person anywhere in the world. Representatives of the Olympic family will also be able to travel free of charge by train between Olympic venues, and families and relatives of athletes will be provided with accommodation (again at the expense of the Games organizers). In addition, each of the 200 National Olympic Committees will be offered $50,000 for training sessions in England.