POSTED: January 27th 2011
NewsUpdate
Rogge says illegal betting is as much of a danger to sport as doping
KEIR RADNEDGE in Lausanne / Sports Features Communications
LAUSANNE, Jan 27: Jacques Rogge believes the Olympic movement must be on its guard against the dangers posed by the rapidly-expanding world of illegal betting.
Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, was opening a symposium on the subject organised in Lausanne at the Olympic Museum by AIPS, the international sports journalists’ association.
He said: “Illegal betting is a major challenge for sport at the same level as doping. The IOC has tackled this since 2007 by adapting rules and regulations to sanction everybody if need be. We’ve established a network with the international federations.
“We have also established a monitoring company which has not spotted any suspicious betting statistics so we tend to believe that there has never been any illegal beting on the Olympics. However, we should not naïve. It will happen one day and we have to be prepared and ready.
“We have to work with the lotteries and betting companies in having a safe and clean sport.
“One very important partner is governments and so the IOC will organise, on March 1, a first meeting between the sports movement and governments who have legislated in the field of betting. We will call on their support in the same way as we did in 1998 in creating WADA because the sports movement cannot carry on this fight alone.”
Nieminen concern
World Lottery Association President Risto Nieminen said the value of sport as entertainment could be based and valued only within the context of fair competition.
"Cases of match fixing are dramatic and terrible but the new threat which has come with the explosion of the financial value of sports and the development of information technology is organised crime with money laundering the most important goal.
"It could be that sport today is the easiest place to launder money. There are still some weak areas in the sports world..the structures such as clubs, associations and the international federations were not set up to function in a period where so much money is involved. The institutions have not reacted to this development.
"It is time for sport to say we do not allow this kind of betting…we do not want to have any corrupting influence. There must be a dialogue which involves everyone - the media included."
Keywords · Rogge · AIPS · illegal betting · doping
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