By Graham Dunbar
Costa Navarino, Greece: Kirsty Coventry has been elected president of the International Olympic Committee and become the first woman and first African to get perhaps the biggest job in global sports.
The Zimbabwe sports minister and two-time Olympic swimming gold medallist got a stunning first-round win in the seven-candidate contest after voting by 97 IOC member on Thursday (Friday AEDT).
Kirsty Coventry reacts as she delivers a speech after being elected as the new IOC President.Credit: Getty Images
She gets an eight-year mandate into 2033 aged just 41 – youthful by the historical standards of the IOC.
It was the most open and hard-to-call IOC presidential election in decades with no clear front-runner before the vote. Many predicted an absolute majority could take several rounds of votes, but she got the exact total of 49 needed.
Coventry’s win also was a victory for outgoing IOC president Thomas Bach, who has long been seen as promoting her as his successor. He did not use his right to vote.
“I will make all of you very, very proud and hopefully extremely confident in the decision you have taken,” Coventry said in her acceptance speech. “Now we have got some work together.”
Kirsty Coventry speaks with outgoing IOC President Thomas Bach.Credit: Getty Images
Walking to the podium, she was congratulated and kissed on both cheeks by Juan Antonio Samaranch, her expected closest rival who got 28 votes. Third-placed Sebastian Coe got just eight.
Also in the race were four presidents of sports governing bodies: Track and field’s Sebastian Coe, skiing’s Johan Eliasch, cycling’s David Lappartient, and gymnastics’ Morinari Watanabe. Also contending was Prince Feisal al Hussein of Jordan.
Coventry will formally replace her mentor Bach on June 23 – officially Olympic Day – as the 10th IOC president in its 131-year history. Bach reached the maximum 12 years in office.
Key challenges for the 41-year-old Coventry will be steering the Olympic movement through political and sporting issues toward the 2028 Summer Games in Los Angeles, including engaging in diplomacy with US President Donald Trump.
Kirsty Coventry receiving her gold medal after the women’s 200-meter backstroke final at the Beijing 2008 Olympics.Credit: AP
Coventry’s IOC will also need to find a host for the 2036 Summer Games, which could go to India or the Middle East.
It has been a stellar week for Bach, who greeted Coventry and shared warm smiles after her acceptance speech.
Bach was feted on Wednesday in an emotional start to the IOC annual meeting, getting lavish praise and the title of honorary president for life.
His hands-on executive-style presidency will deliver over a financially secure IOC, on track to earn more than $US8 billion in revenue through the 2028 LA Olympics, and with a slate of future hosts through 2034: in Italy, the United States, France, Australia and finally the US again, when the Winter Games return to Salt Lake City.
A signature Bach policy also has been gender parity, with equal quotas of men and women athletes at the 2024 Paris Olympics and giving a better balance of female members of the IOC and the executive board he chairs, which now has seven women among its 15 members, including Coventry.
Coventry won back-to-back titles in 200-meters backstroke at the 2004 Athens Olympics and Beijing four years later. She joined the IOC in 2013, almost one year after a disputed athlete election at the London Olympics. Her place among the four athletes elected was eventually awarded after Court of Arbitration for Sport rulings against two opponents.
The voters in the exclusive invited club of IOC members include royal family members, former lawmakers and diplomats, business leaders, sports officials and Olympic athletes. Even an Oscar-winning actress, Michelle Yeoh.
Members voted without hearing further presentations from the candidates in an election that swung on a discreet network of friendships and alliances largely forged out of sight.
AP
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