ÖOC: New elections will become a never-ending story

The new election of the leadership body of the Austrian Olympic Committee (ÖOC) would actually have been on the agenda in 2021. Due to the corona-related postponement of the Summer Games in Tokyo, the term of office of President Karl Stoss and his team was extended. It is rather unlikely that new elections will finally be held at the general meeting scheduled for today at 11 a.m. in Vienna. The critical voices against the leadership style of Stoss and his general secretary Peter Mennel have recently become increasingly louder. Last night a new development became known that could make the new election impossible. An arbitration tribunal, which was set up on May 25th because of the dispute over the dismissal of a previous election committee, has apparently shown that there was a foul on the part of the ÖOC in the election procedure. In addition, investigations by the public prosecutor’s office make it difficult to exonerate the current ÖOC board, as the new election would require.

Last week, critics of the ÖOC dual seats with President Stoss and Mennel submitted a statement of facts to the Vienna public prosecutor’s office through a lawyer, in which the accusation of breach of trust or aiding and abetting in breach of trust was raised. This is about the crowd-funding platform “I Believe in You”, whose balance sheet loss of at least 415,000 euros was allegedly offset by the ÖOC without the necessary board resolution.

Disagreement at the ÖFB

On Wednesday, a kind of declaration of solidarity was made public, which, according to the ÖOC, was due to a “private initiative” by Hans Spohn, the president of the speed skating association. 24 professional associations have expressed their confidence in Stoss and Mennel. Yesterday morning, ÖFB General Secretary Thomas Hollerer revoked the fact that the ÖFB football association was among the signatories. However, he was then called back by ÖFB Vice President Herbert Hübel. The Salzburg association president supported the declaration of solidarity as a representative of the ÖFB. ÖFB President Klaus Mitterdorfer did not want to comment on the matter.

The ÖOC’s reaction to the arbitration tribunal’s decision was not long in coming. Since a member of the arbitration tribunal had resigned from his mandate prematurely, the ruling of the “arbitration body” was irrelevant. The member who left the arbitration court early is speed skating president Spohn, who also submitted a motion for the elimination of the umbrella organization representatives from the election commission at the general meeting.

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