THE president of the Bulgarian Olympic Committee (BOC) and the Bulgarian Football Union (BFU) Ivan Slavkov was expelled from the structures of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) at a closed session of the organisation, held in Singapore on Thursday, July 7.
Prior to the meeting in Singapore, Slavkov's rights in the IOC were temporarily suspended on the basis of allegations of corruption in August 2004 after he was implicated in a BBC documentary on bribery. He was caught on tape discussing how votes could be bought "under the table" in the bidding for the 2012 Olympic games host country.
The session in Singapore was held behind closed doors and Slavkov was allowed to make a 20-minute plea in his defence. Only 12 IOC members supported him, while 82 voted for his expulsion.
Following this decision, Slavkov has to resign from his posts in the BOC. It was expected that his place in the organisation would be taken by Stefka Kostadinova, currently Deputy Minister of Sport in Bulgaria.
Slavkov cannot retain his post as president of the BFU either. Football is an Olympic sport and members expelled from the IOC are not allowed to keep administrative posts in any of the Olympic sports' local federations.
Slavkovwas not too concerned about his expulsion from IOC.
"The IOC will lose a lot more than me by taking this decision. I expected that I would be expelled. Still, there were about 20 people that did not vote against me. I have no idea which members supported me, I had no conversations with any of them prior to the session in Singapore. This decision had already been taken a long time before this meeting. There were no discussions whatsoever, they just heard my 20-minute plea and expelled me," Slavkov said after he returned to Bulgaria.
"This whole thing turned really into a very bad affair for the public image of Bulgaria. They did not give him much of a chance to defend himself. The decision for his expulsion will have a negative impact on the Bulgarian sports in general, because we don't have a strong lobby in the IOC structures anymore. I do not want to blame Slavkov for anything before I speak directly to himz,"Kostadinova said.