Stakeholders in Action
During the past few months, several stakeholders have continued to undertake a number of important initiatives in the field of governance and the protection of sports integrity. Here is a quick overview, featuring the stakeholders and their activities in alphabetical order:
ASOIF
The Association of Summer Olympic International Federations (ASOIF) recently launched its Fifth Review of IF Governance. The self-assessment questionnaire was distributed to the ASOIF members at the end of October for completion by mid-January. This iteration introduces 10 new indicators in addition to the 50 from the fourth edition, to ensure the questionnaire remains up to date and takes account of the latest evolutions in sports governance. The final report will be published in early summer 2024. The aim of the project, led by ASOIF’s Governance Task Force (GTF), on which the IOC is also represented, is to promote and ensure a culture of good governance within the IFs and help drive continuous progress.
FIBA
Following the example set by the majority of NOCs, FIBA has created a network of integrity officers (Single Points of Contacts = SPOCs) across its National Federations (NFs) and organised a second meeting for these contacts from 2 to 3 November in Athens, Greece. The OM Unit PMC joined the meeting to provide an update on its activities, including plans for the Olympic competitions in 2024.
International World Games Association
The International World Games Association (IWGA) recently adopted the Olympic Movement Code on the Prevention of Manipulation of Competitions (OM Code PMC), and is amending its Rules accordingly in view of the 12th edition of the World Games. The event will take place from 7 to 17 August 2025 in Chengdu, China, with 35 sports on the programme. The host city is expecting 5,000 participants from more than 100 countries. The main rules affected concern the prohibition of betting, manipulation of competitions, sharing of information, and failure to report and cooperate. Read more.
Swiss Olympic and Swiss Federal Institute of Sport
In November, the NOC of Switzerland announced that it will allocate an additional CHF 400,000 to Swiss Sport Integrity's whistleblowing service. With this additional contribution, Swiss Olympic recognises the need, urgency and necessity to strengthen the ethical reporting service, which has been in great demand since its introduction at the beginning of 2022.
At the same time, Swiss Olympic is working intensively to optimise promotional structures and coordinate preventive measures through the "Ethics in Swiss Sport" project – for instance through initiatives like the "Are you OK?" campaign, an ethical compass and a topical podcast series. The project is implemented in cooperation with the Swiss Federal Institute of Sport Magglingen (part of the Federal Office of Sport), and also includes the implementation of a significant part of the IPACS Sport Governance Benchmark.
In this connection, the Swiss Federal Institute of Sport also hosted an online symposium on "Athlete power and representation" on 15 November. The foundation for the ongoing work on the Ethics in Swiss Sport project is a baseline report that was completed at the end of last year.
World Sailing
During the 2023 World Sailing Annual Conference, held in Malaga, Spain, in November, the Council of World Sailing announced its support for important next steps in the organisation’s governance reform, and approved amendments to the Disciplinary and Ethics Regulations, Anti-Doping Rules and the Betting and Anti-Corruption Code. Read more.
World Taekwondo
World Taekwondo is another IF which has put together a “global framework” of integrity officers for its sport, starting with a specific contact for each of its five Continental Unions. These integrity officers will address the prevention of competition manipulation and safeguarding matters. A first coordination meeting was organised virtually on 21 November.