It was a green scarf that was the secret sign that would change the course of Sydney history forever.
Thirty years ago on September 23, 1993 in Monaco, 88 International Olympic Committee delegates filed into the Louis II Stadium to decide which city would host the 2000 Olympic Games. I was in the crowd that day, along with thousands of other officials and journalists from around the world. It was the early hours of September 24 in Sydney, and thousands of sports fans, including Olympian Dawn Fraser, had gathered at Circular Quay.
John Fahey and Rod McGeoch in Monaco in 1993, celebrating Sydney winning the hosting rights for the 2000 Olympic Games.Credit: Palani Mohan
Even before we knew what the green scarf symbolised you could feel the tension in the air at the 101st IOC Session in Monte Carlo.
Four rounds of voting, five bid cities: Manchester, Istanbul, Berlin, Beijing and Sydney vying to host.
It was as dramatic as the Catholic cardinals gathering in Rome to choose a new pope. But unlike the papal conclave, where a two-thirds majority is required before the white smoke indicating a choice has been made, Sydney needed a firm 50 percent; 45 of the 88 IOC votes there that day.
John Major, then UK prime minister, was there to support his country’s bid, and our then-prime minister, Paul Keating, was there to support ours. His entourage had flown in from Washington, where he met then-US president Bill Clinton just as the Middle East Peace Treaty was being signed on the lawns of the White House on September 13.
There was a plethora of pollies: NSW premier John Fahey and his minister for the Olympics bid Bruce Baird, NSW opposition leader Bob Carr, Sydney lord mayor Frank Sartor, federal sports minister Ros Kelly, former PM Gough Whitlam, whose African diplomacy helped win over African delegates, and federal opposition leader John Hewson.
Sports stars Evonne Goolagong Cawley and Kieran Perkins were there, as was opera singer Dame Joan Sutherland to lend support.
Tanya Blencowe among delegates including Kieren Perkins in Monte Carlo.Credit: Palani Mohan
While 11-year-old Sydney schoolgirl Tanya Blencowe, from Bangor Primary, stole the show, when it came to Sydney’s presentation, it was Keating’s then-wife Annita who was the Sydney bid’s secret ingredient, thanks to her fluency in five languages, which helped ensure support from European delegates.
Three decades later, hers is the presentation I remember as most convincing and sincere. Her French was flawless, her English impeccable, and I’m told her German, Italian and native Dutch were too.
When asked by journalists how he thought the Sydney presentation had gone that day, Keating joked: “At this stage of the game, it’s like trying to pick a Surry Hills selection ballot at five to six on a Saturday night – forget about it.”
Behind closed doors, Beijing came out victor in the first round of votes: 32 to Sydney’s 30. For the two Australians on the International Olympic Committee, Kevan Gosper and Phil Coles, the wait was agonising.
After costly failed bids by Brisbane for the 1992 Olympics and Melbourne for 1996, there was a lot at stake. Coles, who died in January this year, and his wife Patricia had based themselves in Paris in the lead-up to the September decision in order to lobby European IOC members.
Going into the fourth and final round, Sydney was eight short of the winning 45 votes, with only 11 Manchester votes available to pick up once they were eliminated in the final two-city showdown.
The Sydney bid had become close to Venezuelan IOC member Flor Isava-Fonseca in the years they spent lobbying. So they arranged with her a secret sign to indicate Sydney’s success – or not.
Isava-Fonseca promised she would wear a green scarf from left to right across her shoulder if Sydney had survived to the last round.
Flor Isava-Fonseca, former IOC delegate from Venezula and wearer of the secret green scarf. Credit: ANOC
The first to spot that she was wearing it was Elizabeth Fox, the lobbyist for the Sydney bid for South America.
“We’ve made the final,” she whispered to a friend sitting beside her.
Still no one, apart from the three scrutineers who had counted the votes, knew the final round of voting.
The result, in a sealed envelope, was in IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch’s coat pocket, and not even he knew.
He fumbled with the seal on the envelope before announcing: “And the winner is …” – and stumbled pronouncing “SID EY” the winner. (Not “Syd en ney” which is often reported.)
You couldn’t miss Fahey and Baird leap into the air and the orange-shirted Australians jumping for joy. Even I hugged the journalist sitting beside me (fellow Aussie journo, Nicole Jeffery, then from an opposing newspaper, now a friend).
Sydney had won by a mere two votes, 45-43. Among the celebrations, I do recall the downcast looks of those from the Beijing bid.
Scenes from Homebush Bay after the announcement, September 24, 1993.Credit: Dean Sewell
While we went to work covering the story, back in Sydney at 4.27am, the crowd erupted. The Opera House was lit with the Olympic symbol and Centrepoint Tower was transformed into a giant Olympic torch. Aeroplane signwriters wrote “onya Sydney”, the stockmarket surged and newspapers printed dawn editions for the first time since man walked on the moon.
The Sydney Morning Herald reported in a six broadsheet page wrap-around that PM Keating planned to use the Olympics win to push the republican cause and call for a new flag, and that “the opening of the 2000 Games may be the last act by Queen Elizabeth II as head of state, before she is replaced by an Australian.”
While that didn’t eventuate, the predicted massive home town advantage for our Olympics medal tally did. “The decision is expected to herald a golden age in sport like in Melbourne at the 1956 Olympics, where we won a record 35 medals: 13 gold, eight silver and 14 bronze medals,” one report said. That is exactly what happened, with Sydney reaping our highest Olympic medal tally, of 58: 16 gold, 25 silver and 17 bronze in 2000.
We didn’t know then Samaranch would seven years later declare Sydney 2000 the “best games ever”. But that night in Monaco was the best party ever for the Australians who assembled at the then-Loews Hotel.
Fireworks during the Sydney 2000 closing ceremony – declared the “best games ever”.Credit: AP
The green scarf story circulated widely that night, as did the French champagne (details are hazy, but it was an all-nighter, with me running back and forth from the public telephone making reverse-charge calls with various Australians to speak to the ABC Radio Mornings host Phil Clark.)
But it was the Sydney bid’s leader Rod McGeoch who summed up the mood most succinctly; “the Riviera maybe ritzier, but on a night such as this there is no place like home … or indeed Homebush.”
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