What seemed like everything was going badly before Russia’s Catastrophic invasion of Ukraine happened, now Amateur Boxing is facing its worst crisis in its history after being adopted as an Olympic sport in 1904.
AIBA became the official IOC-recognized boxing organization decades ago, in the 1940s, with the responsibility of organizing the association of national boxing federations around the world to devise elimination procedures. abolished in order to secure boxers’ participation in the Olympic Games and to administer such competitions.
Amateur boxing has always been of high importance. Olympic champions have become professional champions and heroes of the world, some of the greatest champions in history have started with Olympic Games glory, some of them are: Muhammad Ali, George Foreman, Joe Frazier, Sugar Ray Leonard and Oscar Delahoya, just to name a few.
AIBA has suffered major changes that have led to scandals in and out of the ring. Countless cases of bad governance have involved corruption, changes to the rules that compromise the integrity of the sport and the health of fighters, and engaging in actions that create a clear conflict of interest. apparently led AIBA to a crisis that led to the ousting of Chairman Ching- Kuo Wu after the executive committee determined he could not continue as Chairman.
Gafur Rakhimov, from Uzbekistan was elected President in 2017. One intends to bring the basic activities of AIBA back to the roots of amateur boxing and the other is supported by the executive committee. .
Rakhimov has faced opposition from the IOC due to scandals created by Wu’s administration as well as from legal attacks on his character, which are now internationally unraveled. However, when the IOC asked him to step down as President in order to continue to be recognized by the federation, Rahimov chose to support boxing and AIBA and decided to voluntarily leave the position of President.
After the Interim President, incumbent President Umar Kremlev, of Russia, was elected in 2020. He has faced extreme complications as the IOC continues to require the AIBA to demonstrate changes in the items. management objectives and procedures, to demonstrate solid governance with good practices. The IOC under Kremlev was unable to do so and in fact the IOC expelled AIBA as an affiliate of the IOC and had to appoint a boxing executive committee for Tokio 2021.
AIBA has just changed its name to IBA and has not yet received IOC recognition.
The Russian invasion has also created a major problem for the IBA in several respects:
– Umar Kremlev, president of IBA, from Russia and international sports governing bodies are banning sports, athletes, teams and executives, so Kremlev could face consequences so.
– The IOC, even before the war, expressed its concern about AIBA, now IBA, about the only funding from Russia because the Russian Oil company GazProm was the sole financial backer for the IBA.
– The Russian Boxing Federation, chaired by Kremlev before becoming president of AIBA, openly supported the war and invasion of Ukraine. This is a big scandal in the world, specifically in the world boxing village.
It is well known that the IBA executive committee cares about the state of boxing in relation to the IOC, as well as internally. Boxing has been suspended from the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics and will only participate in the assessment on a case-by-case basis, Olympic boxing will technically die after Paris 2024.
With all that is going on, Amateur Boxing is facing its last chance to survive. If Umar Kremlev follows Gafur Rakhimov’s unselfish act to save their beloved institution, Kremlev should step down as IBA President and give boxing a chance to regain Olympic status from the IOC under new leadership.
