The Covid-19 pandemic has already had a huge impact on the Olympic Games with the postponement of one year of the 2020 edition scheduled for Tokyo, Japan. But will it have any on the 2024 Games in Paris? To this question, Guy Drut answers in the affirmative. Last Sunday, the former Minister of Sports of Jacques Chirac had declared that the project is now "obsolete, outdated, disconnected from reality. It is no longer in step with reality ”. “The Games must reinvent themselves. We have to rethink them to adapt them, to keep them in line with the changing world, "continued the 110m hurdles Olympic champion in 1976 in Montreal (Canada).
This declaration made the International Olympic Committee (IOC) jump. But also several of its members, including Guy Drut. For Pierre-Olivier Beckers, who has been appointed head of the coordination committee for the Paris Games, these remarks could suggest that the organization is not thought out, and does not take into account the current context.
"His message confuses the project"
“Guy is and has always been, as we know, a whole person. He is a direct man and passionate about the Olympic movement, who wants to do everything to save him at a time when the world is in crisis. I am sure that his carte blanche starts from a good intention. But his message throws confusion around the project. And it is unfortunate that today he is throwing this paving stone into the pond, without having contacted the members of the organizing committee, by going it alone, ”said the Belgian businessman.
Before continuing: "its message suggests that Paris 2024 is not part of a responsible, united and financially respectful logic, when it is a vision expressed from the start by its organizers ( ..) And then, in the light of the Covid-19 crisis, we did not wait to work on the need to go further and think about organizing the Games in a different way ", reveals the IOC member since 2012, in comments reported by Francs Jeux . Before adding that this message was "felt like a missile", in particular because of the words chosen, "like" obsolete "," outdated ", or" disconnected from reality ". They could not be more opposed to the project they are developing, ”sighs the only Belgian representative of the IOC.
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- For Guy Drut, the Paris 2024 project is now "obsolete, outdated and disconnected from reality"