OÖC power struggle: shock troops remain in office

The fuss surrounding the leadership of the Austrian Olympic Committee reached a new high with the Extraordinary General Assembly on Monday morning in Vienna. President Karl Stoss and his leadership team achieved a stage victory. The election proposal submitted by a group led by Union President Peter McDonald, whose intention was to renew the OÖC leadership, was rejected by a vote of 31:13 (two abstentions). A new election committee is now being set up to prepare the autumn elections. The hic-hack in the sign of the five rings is not over yet. A legal aftermath is just picking up speed.

The extraordinary general meeting was originally convened by the five professional associations for swimming, golf, gymnastics, basketball and wrestling. On Friday they withdrew the application and the application for elections. However, the ÖOC stuck to the Monday date and also to the vote on the proposal criticized by the current management team.

According to an expert opinion, however, the applicants are now of the opinion that no extraordinary general meeting could take place with legal effect and that all further steps by the entire board of directors are “void”.

The representatives of 40 professional associations as well as the IOC member (Stoss) and two representatives of the athletes’ commission were entitled to vote, Sport Austria and the umbrella organizations ASKÖ, ASVÖ and Sportunion each have one vote.

All of the 47 voters except for one trade association (fencing) were present in a Viennese hotel, the meeting was scheduled to start at 11 a.m. One representative from each trade association was allowed to attend the meeting. The gymnastics association was present with two, since Gabriela Jahn, as a member of the election proposal, gave a statement.

The election proposal, which has now been rejected, continued to see Stoss as president. Roswitha Stadlober (Ski Austria) and Sonja Spendelhofer (athletics) were listed as vice-presidents, and Thomas Reichenauer (wrestling) as vice-president. According to the proposal, the board should also consist of the members Markus Prock (tobogganing), Gernot Leitner (volleyball), Martin Poiger (judo), Elke Romauch (tennis), Jahn, Horst Nussbaumer (rowing), Gerald Martens (basketball) and Arno Pajek (swimming) together.

The current board of directors led by President Karl Stoss has been in office since March 2017, but the period was extended to 2023 due to the postponement of the Tokyo Games.