Start of crisis for Ski-VM – VG

Even before the formal agreement is in place, unfortunately both the FIS and the Trøndelag World Cup enthusiasts at the municipal level have managed to come off really lopsided from the edge of the jump.

Has the idea of ​​animating the people of the square and Trøndelag with Norwegian flags painted on their faces led to the AP-dominated axis of power being vaccinated against criticism and judgment?

It is a fact that NO ONE else applied to host the Ski World Cup in 2025.

Exactly that could have given Norway and Trondheim a unique opportunity to set the terms of the FIS. “Our way or no way” might be a sensible line. A completely transparent and clear process around what is chosen and what is rejected could generate confidence around an investment of one billion, which necessarily goes at the expense of other ends. Here it must be remembered that it is the taxpayers who take the risk if something goes wrong.

Instead, the content of the contract now being signed with FIS indicates that they are far from dancing to the beat of mimes. It should have been possible to guarantee greater flexibility and independent room for maneuver for the decisions themselves in case of need for change, than the degree of detail in the promises to the FIS expressed in the agreement.

And the road to signing a “host contract” has turned out to be messy and unacceptable from a democratic perspective.

• Messy because the politicians in the presidency received a contract with a ridiculously bad deadline to get acquainted with a complete and technically detailed document in English. We have known for centuries that Trondheim is the only candidate. So it seems completely unnecessary that politicians didn’t have enough time to verify everything they might want, to be completely sure on the basis of a yes or no vote. The fact that in the end there was a slight postponement of treatment does not change the impression that was left behind that something had to be rushed for everyone in the world.
• Unacceptable because the attempt to keep the content of the agreement secret from the public is in direct conflict with the values ​​on which it should be based. Openness in sports management has been an important topic for many years. Knowing how closed many international sports organizations are, such extensive collaboration with the FIS should have triggered the value of transparency to be communicated very clearly. But the municipality of Trondheim and the FIS tried, fortunately in vain, to close the door.

The municipal director tried to reassure Adresseavisen that he could assure that the contract had been “thoroughly reviewed.” But dear Mr. Director, this is not really how democratic control mechanisms should work. There is also reason to wonder about the awareness in Trondheim about what kind of contracting party they have.

“I don’t think we should compare the IOC and the Olympics with the FIS and the World Cup,” says the same director.

Of course there are differences here, but at the same time the ties are close and some cultural characteristics are comparable.

Gian-Franco Kasper has been president of the FIS for 22 consecutive years, before which he was the organization’s general secretary. Kasper, 76, was a member of the International Olympic Committee for 18 years (2000-2018) and is the “honorary life president” of the AIOWF, the international association for winter Olympic sports.

The leader of an organization that relies on snow has been critical of man-made climate change, claiming that it is easier to organize the Olympics in dictatorships. On the presiding board, all elected members (except an athlete’s representative) are men, and Norway also exchanged an elder for another elder the last time there was a vacancy.

Now, it is true that Kasper will resign soon, but here it rains so much that the surveillance of Trøndelag should have been completely different.

At the back, the Conservatives, who also want the World Cup, made a laudable attempt to secure a more robust review and quality assurance before committing to the neck.

But now, on Thursday, the majority in the presidency had deaf ears. Here, among other things, the representative of the Liberal Party stated that the great battle is supposed to take place later and that the freedom of action is great when it comes to guaranteeing sobriety in the facilities. However, the contract was not intended to be seen by the public, it appears that FIS has a significant influence regarding any moderation on the construction side (see data box). How thoroughly has the Liberal representative read the agreement?

But these questions may not be as important in the municipality of Trondheim, as long as politicians can enjoy some gold in the winter of 2025.

Unfortunately, the World Cup has had a crisis start.