‘Extremely concerned’: Boxing’s Olympic future in doubt

Boxing’s Olympic future remains very much in doubt after members of the sport’s governing body, the International Boxing Association (IBA) voted against holding a presidential election last weekend, reaffirming the leadership of controversial president Umar Kremlev.

Concerned about allegations of corruption inside the IBA and a match-fixing scandal at the 2016 Rio Olympics, the International Olympic Committee has left boxing off the initial program for the 2028 Los Angeles Games.

IOC officials have left open the possibility of restoring boxing when the final LA program is completed next September or October, but have repeated concerns about the way Kremlev, a Russian sports executive, is leading the IBA.

The IOC oversaw the boxing competition at the Tokyo Olympics and announced earlier this year that it would do so again for Paris 2024 after the IBA disqualified Dutch boxing official Boris van der Vorst from a previous presidential election that Kremlev then won unopposed.

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) later ruled that van der Vorst shouldn’t have been disqualified, setting up Sunday’s vote, which many saw as perhaps a last chance for boxing to remain in the Olympics after Paris.

But after IBA members voted against holding an election, 106-36, Kremlev remains in his position.

Though Kremlev has promised to reform the IBA, he has alarmed IOC officials by moving much of the organisation’s operations from Lausanne, Switzerland to Russia, has spent heavily on marketing that appeared to promote himself and has resisted calls for an outside organisation to handle the assignment of judges and referees at events.

The IOC has also expressed worry that the IBA’s lone sponsor is Russian energy company Gazprom, which has supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.