“Help chapín sports, athletes and their families will thank you wholeheartedly”
The International Olympic Committee (IOC) made official this Sunday the suspension of Guatemala from all events of the Olympic cycle in a statement on its social networks.
The suspension had already been warned previously, the IOC made it clear in August 2022 that if the Constitutional Court (CC) did not lift the sanction on the statuses of the Guatemalan Olympic Committee (COG), Guatemala would be suspended of all activity that has to do with events of the Olympic cycle.
The fact is a hard blow for all Guatemalan athletes, who have been left without the option of competing for the country’s flag on the road to events that will culminate in 2024 with the Olympic Games in Paris.. Athletes could still appear at the jousts, but under the IOC banner.
In this sense, Kevin Cordón, one of the most outstanding and well-known Guatemalan athletes worldwide, due to his excellent participation in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games where he finished in a historic fourth place, expressed regarding the sanction and sent a message to the authorities.
“Chapín sport does not deserve this. That they help chapín sport (the authorities). That the athletes and their families will thank you wholeheartedly”, commented the 35-year-old badminton player.
Another of the Guatemalan athletes who made his opinion known was Luis Carlos Rivero, long-distance running athlete.
“The situation that the Guatemalan Olympic Committee is going through is a link of negative consequences that today closes the chain of bad decisions and we fall to the point of being suspended by the International Olympic Committee” mentions.
“It is a struggle of political powers, today we see ourselves with two sides. As always, the most affected are the athletes. Neither one of the sides has shown its face or a public opinion, that is unfortunate because someone has to raise their voice. No one wanted to show their faces and the deadline (so as not to be suspended) expired, we are on October 16 and the suspension has already become official”.
In view of the IOC Executive Board decision on 8 September 2022 and as no solution could be found between the NOC and the relevant authorities in Guatemala within the deadlines, the suspension of the NOC of Guatemala has become effective on 15 October. 👇https://t.co/6t16zX6JAE pic.twitter.com/D6NPMQWOQN
— IOC MEDIA (@iocmedia) October 16, 2022
“The most affected are the athletes, I continue training and with the same dreams and the same illusion. I am looking for space to see how to represent Guatemala in the different events, but without carrying the flag it is very unfortunate“, keep going.
“I urge all the organizations involved to try to resolve their differences in favor of sport and leave aside political interests.” he concluded.
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