The young umbrella organization World Boxing is gaining in importance just one year after it was founded. Is he the partner the IOK is looking for for the boxing tournament for the 2028 Games in Los Angeles?
Boris van der Vorst positioned himself in front of the webcam in a blazer and T-shirt; he wanted to appear serious but not too formal. In the Netherlands today, happy occasions can definitely be approached in an informal style, and the first birthday of the umbrella organization World Boxing, which the 51-year-old co-founded, is definitely one of them for him.
This was one of the most important messages that the sports official from Utrecht wanted to convey to the journalists connected on Thursday in the form of an international video conference.
Some of them did not react without skepticism when the Dutchman and a few colleagues from various countries founded a second, competing association for Olympic boxing on April 13th last year. World Boxing, as it is called, was supposed to represent the sport more convincingly than the established International Boxing Association (IBA) has managed recently. Such a noble idea is quickly formulated – but in the meantime enough life has been breathed into it, as President van der Vorst and Simon Toulson, his English Secretary General, proudly stated.
As of now, almost thirty national boxing associations have decided to change sides, including opinion leaders such as USA Boxing, Boxing Australia and several organizations in Europe. There are also 25 to 30 other candidates “in the pipeline,” as Toulson called it, whose performance is being checked against an extensive catalog of association ethical criteria. According to van der Vorst, this is “quite a process”; Ultimately, however, the choice of allies does not allow for “any shortcuts”.
In addition, clear tasks and structures for establishing flawless governance were adopted at the founding congress in Frankfurt, which was attended by delegates from 26 national associations at the end of November.
IBA’s objection rejected
All in all, that would be little more than a stage success – if there wasn’t a special moment of momentum. The International Court of Arbitration for Sport (TAS) recently rejected the IBA’s objection to the decision of the International Olympic Committee (IOK) from June 2023, according to which the world association led by the Russian Umar Kremlev no longer belongs to the family.
This verdict amounts to a knock-out for the IBA’s Olympic perspective – and on the other hand opens a door for World Boxing, without mentioning the association by name. Nothing else can be gleaned in terms of subtext from the IOK’s statement on the TAS ruling, which was published the following day.
“Because of the universality and high level of social integration” of boxing, the goal is to keep it in the program of Olympic competitions. However, it will not be organized a third time in Los Angeles in 2028 – as was the case at the Games in Tokyo (2021) and this year in Paris, where a task force took over this task instead of the IBA, which was already provisionally suspended in 2019. For this reason, “a recognized and reliable international association is needed as a partner, just like in all other Olympic sports”.
The goal: to preserve the Olympic option for all active participants
Van der Vorst and Co. would have been happy to hear that. From the outset, their aim was to preserve the Olympic option for all participants by building a new, positive relationship with the decision-makers in Lausanne. These found their values reflected under the umbrella of the IBA neither in the behavior of the judges nor in terms of transparency.
In addition, they were always offended by the fact that Kremlin’s leadership team relied on unspecified donations from the sponsor Gazprom for financing – and thwarted Kremlin’s only competitor in the presidential elections two years ago with procedural tricks. His name was Boris van der Vorst.
So World Boxing suddenly appears to be the only serious address where national associations and their athletes can perhaps pursue their dream of the Olympics even beyond Paris. The reaction to the TAS ruling, which World Boxing published two days later, was ultimately aimed in this direction. This is “a clear and unequivocal message to all national associations” to support World Boxing or to try to be accepted there, it said. Anyone who doesn’t understand this is making a serious mistake that will be “ruinous for the sport and highly destructive for its boxers.”
This may seem dramatically exaggerated. Nevertheless, the President and his Secretary General assured that preliminary calls from all sorts of countries are now increasingly arriving. A rough estimate is that 65 to 75 national associations would need to be included in the IOK for World Boxing to be fully integrated. This number is unlikely to be achieved this year. Meanwhile, work is underway to finalize negotiations with a global sports equipment supplier – having already signed a four-year sponsorship deal with an Australian boxing equipment manufacturer.