2012 OLYMPIC GAMES:OF ALL the negative stories – from transport meltdowns to security scares – likely to afflict the London Olympics before Danny Boyle's opening ceremony, yesterday's was the most predictable. And yet it is also potentially among the most damaging.
Claims that 27 representatives of 54 countries – more than a quarter of the total number whose athletes will march around the track in Stratford in the name of Olympic values – were prepared to break International Olympic Committee rules and sell thousands of tickets on the black market will not come as a big surprise .
Yet the numbers involved still shock – €7,500 demanded for “AA” blue riband tickets sloshing around in a global market for an event staged in venues built with billions of pounds of public money.
For the IOC, which had spent much of the past decade ridding itself of the stain of the Salt Lake City scandal, and for London 2012 organisers, battling public cynicism about ticketing, cronyism and corporate might, it could not have come at a worse time.
Jacques Rogge could afford a degree of quiet satisfaction as he reflected last week on the upcoming London Games.
There was no last-minute panic to finish the venues, no international outcry over human rights. Rogge, who will stand down next year after 12 years in the IOC’s top job, had hoped to leave behind an organisation in rude financial health and with a restored reputation for probity and transparency.
As fires raged at Fifa, the IOC was last year able to bask in the fact that in comparison it looked like a model international governing body. The calm hand on the tiller of the Belgian former Olympic sailor, elected in 2001 in the wake of the Salt Lake City bribery scandal, had made it appear a beacon of good practice next to Sepp Blatter’s Fifa.
The speed with which the IOC reacted to the Sunday Times allegations reflects the extent to which they threaten to sully that good name. The claims may involve only “thousands” of tickets among 8.8 million but perception is everything.
At a general assembly of the Association of National Olympic Committees in Acapulco in October 2010, Locog chairman Sebastian Coe, acknowledged the threat when he said tough action would be taken against anyone who broke the rules regarding distribution of the 1.1 million tickets for overseas buyers and reminded them of the inquiring nature of the British media.
Yet widespread suspicions remained, only exacerbated by the recent resignation of the general secretary of the Ukrainian Olympic Committee when he was caught by a similar BBC sting.
The IOC was keen in its hastily released statement to underline the NOCs involved were “autonomous”. The same goes for the international federations of Olympic sports similarly involved from time to time in scandal.
And London organisers can justifiably point to having done more to combat touting than any previous games – including specific warnings to overseas Olympic committees. They also stressed none of the tickets involved were among the 6.6 million allocated to the British public. However, those distinctions mean little to the public.
Many of those who have struggled to secure tickets for the biggest events and already feel ill disposed towards what they see as preferential treatment for sponsors and blazers will see this as more evidence for the prosecution.
The timing is less than ideal for London organisers just as, they hoped, growing buzz would translate into an acceleration in sales for almost 2 million remaining tickets for football and high-priced options for less popular sports and drown out complaints over sponsors and selection controversies.
Lessons must be learned, and the way the IOC allocates and distributes tickets must surely change.
In the meantime, the immediate reaction of the IOC and Locog to this latest controversy will do much to inform the ongoing battle for the hearts and minds of the public attitude to the Olympic Games – in London, in the UK and beyond.
