Dhe top-class sports reform, which the then Federal Minister of the Interior Thomas de Maizière initiated in July 2015 with his call for a third more medals at the Olympic Games and which led to considerable changes in the structures of top-class German sport, is not, according to the experts in the associations, athletic structurally even close to the goal. There is a lack of a consistent overall concept, complain those responsible for top-class sport from a number of associations. Standard thinking, small parts and bureaucracy determined the actions. This destabilizes even successful associations.
The German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB), whose President Thomas Weikert, CEO Torsten Burmester and top sports director Dirk Schimmelpfennig received the fire letter from the sports directors on Friday, currently does not want to comment on the allegations. The first thing to do is talk to those involved. Signed – with a sporting greeting – a spokesman for the sports directors, which has not yet appeared in public. It consists of Idriss Gonschinska, the chairman of the athletics association, Jens Kahl, sports director of the canoe association, Jörg Bügner from triathlon, Axel Kromer from handball, Richard Prause from table tennis, Jannis Zamanduridis from wrestling, Tino Koch from jujutsu – and Antje Franke from the Scuba Divers Association.
No comments on the allegations: The DOSB is under criticism.
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Image: dpa
The reasons for complaints from the experts are new bureaucratic requirements on the part of the DOSB with regard to association discussions and management criteria. For the associations it is unclear who controls top-class sport and its promotion. They do not see the distribution of roles between the DOSB and the Federal Ministry of the Interior, which promotes top-class sport and the associations with a good 300 million euros a year, as having been clarified. They accuse the DOSB of changing its self-image away from lobbyists and supporters towards controllers. “One of the primary tasks of the DOSB should be to support the top associations on their way to the top at international level,” says the letter: “This is the only way to achieve the global goal of top 5 in Olympic summer sports and top 3 in Olympic winter sports.”
Alarming list of deficiencies
37 medals, ninth place in the unofficial but for the German elite sports organization relevant medal table continued a trend at the Summer Olympics in Tokyo 2021 (with 10 gold medals, 11 silver and 16 third places), the decline despite a doubling of elite sports funding the union within ten years. This is one of the reasons why the Ministry of the Interior is planning a top-class sports company that is independent of sport and the state to distribute the millions and to control their use. It is scheduled to be established this year.
The plan, although it is unlikely to be implemented against the resistance of the DOSB, is aimed at its disempowerment. This highlights the role of Schimmelpfennig, the strong man in top-class German sport. His contract expires at the end of the year. An extension is not only opposed to the fact that the DOSB, as soon as the top sports GmbH exists, hardly needs a board for competitive sports. The contract cannot be extended as long as a commission has not evaluated the behavior of the then DOSB President Alfons Hörmann and his team in dealing with anonymous allegations from the DOSB staff. Former board member Karin Fehres had been pressured into admitting to writing the anonymous letter, although she denied authorship.
The sporting directors come up with an alarming list of shortcomings. This includes that promotion should be geared towards potential instead of success and that trainers should receive reliable employment contracts and appropriate remuneration. They demand that athletes’ representatives take part in structural talks, that the base structure be appropriately concentrated and that competitive sport be scientifically supported. These cornerstones remained largely empty, they write. Your point: The list comes from the concept of the DOSB and the Ministry of the Interior for the restructuring of competitive sports. The general assembly of the DOSB decided it in 2017.
