IOC head praises Greek Olympic organizers
Rogge: ‘I’m an extremely happy president’
The Associated Press
Updated: 9:09 a.m. ET Aug. 29, 2004
ATHENS, Greece - International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge praised Athens organizers Sunday for putting on “splendid” games and defying the skeptics who thought Greece wouldn’t be able to deliver.
In a wide-ranging news conference on the final day of the Summer Olympics, Rogge said Athens had pulled off a rousing success despite the concerns over construction delays, security threats and cost overruns.
“I’m an extremely happy president of the IOC,” Rogge said. “We always expressed our confidence in our Greek friends. I’ve always said I believed there was enough time to finish the preparations in due time. Many did not believe me.”
“I think our friends have delivered in Athens in a very splendid way.”
The Greek government spent upward of $8.5 billion to get venues and transportation systems ready in time. That included an unprecedented $1.5 billion security system featuring 70,000 police and soldiers, surveillance cameras and a blimp.
Praising an Olympics that had gone off without major incident, Rogge said the security had been “flawless.” He also noted that ticket sales of 3.55 million had topped the figures from Seoul and Barcelona, international sports federations praised the venues as “outstanding,” and global broadcasters reported that TV ratings were up more than 15 percent from Sydney four years ago.
Rogge said he would offer a “very warm” final verdict on the games in his speech at Sunday night’s closing ceremony. Unlike his predecessor, Juan Antonio Samaranch, he will not consider calling them the “best ever.”
“The Olympic Games is a competition between athletes,” Rogge said. “It’s not a competition between organizing committees.”
Moving to other topics, Rogge said the IOC will consult with international sports federations to avoid the judging and scoring errors that affected gymnastics, equestrian, fencing and other sports.
Rogge reiterated the IOC will not consider changing the result of the men’s all-around gymnastics competition in which America’s Paul Hamm won the gold after judges incorrectly scored the parallel bars routine of South Korea Yang Tae-young.
The international gymnastics federation, FIG, has asked Hamm to give up the medal in a gesture of sportsmanship. But the U.S. Olympic Committee called the request “deplorable” and said FIG should take responsibility for its own mistakes.
“Our position is extremely simple,” Rogge said. “The FIG has certified the result of the gymnastics competition. The IOC has awarded the medals according to the certified results. Paul Hamm was declared the winner and therefore he has received the gold medal, and for us that is final.”
Rogge said the IOC would not be part of any effort to ask Hamm to hand back the medal.
“This is final,” he repeated.
With at least 22 athletes caught for drug violations in Athens, Rogge said the anti-doping program had been a major success. More athletes could be exposed — and medals stripped — in coming months when the IOC analyzes samples which have been stored for further analysis, he said.
“Definitely this is one of the weapons we want to use,” he said.
Rogge said the IOC will expand drug testing for the 2006 Winter Games in Turin, Italy, and 2008 Summer Games in Beijing. Nearly one in four athletes was tested in Athens, and that figure will “vastly increase,” he said.
Most of the banned substances detected in Athens have been drugs which go back decades, including the steroid stanozolol. Rogge said that’s because those drugs are effective and easy to purchase on the black market. He attributed the absence of any positives for EPO, human growth hormone or other high-tech drugs to a deterrent effect.
As for the outcome of the games, Rogge singled out the emergence of Asia, which recorded a 50 percent increase in gold medals from Sydney, and predicted an even stronger performance in Beijing.
“These were the games where we saw the awakening of Asia,” Rogge said.
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