Sunday 18 September 2016

Kirsan to go - but not quite yet

Apart from the chess at the Olympiad, the other big games was politics. After the release of the FIDE financial report showing how much trouble FIDE is in, there were plenty of rumours floating about the Kirsan Ilyumzhinov was for the chop.
The juiciest claim was that there is a "sugar daddy" is the wings, willing to invest 10 million Euro's in FIDE, but only if Kirsan stood down. This did not happen at the Congress (a motion of no confidence was ruled out of order), so it will be interesting if the offer is around in 2018 (assuming the story is true).
From a more credible (and very high level 'inner circle' source) is the claim that Kirsan will not run in 2018 anyway. He has lost the confidence of the Continental President of America, Jorge Vega, and without this large block of votes he realises he has no chance of winning.
At this stage no replacment has been seriously suggested. A few names have been floated privately (Filatov, Vega or Sheik Sultan Bin Khalifa Al-Nehyan) but they have either said no, or haven't got an organised ticket behind them as yet.
Even if Kirsan goes it is likely at this stage the existing management team will simply hitch themselves to another figure head and hang on to power. The only possibility of effective change is if in the confusion the various continents and federations split into opposing camps, making the election more about policy, and less about patronage.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

If you read Vega's report (Annex 60), the FIDE accounts (UBS) denominated in USD (including the Americas account) were blocked in late June. Not sure it is related to US Treasury against Kirsan, or how it was resolved.