Olympic Committee President Loses Vote of Confidence

At the extraordinary general assembly of the Hungarian Olympic Committee (MOB) on December 30, the confidence in the president Krisztián Kulcsár was withdrawn. The former world and European champion, Olympic silver medallist fencer had held the position since 2017.

24 people voted against the President, 18 were in favour and one invalid vote was cast. Kulcsár accepted the decision and said he would not travel to the Winter Olympics, stepping down on January 31, 2022. If a new president is elected by 1 February, that person could be there in Beijing.

"I'm very sorry that one month before Beijing, the holidays are not purely about family, love and the Olympic spirit," Kulcsár began his speech by apologising for having to read out his thoughts, but he said it was not easy to say all of these.

He stated that he wanted to make public the audio recordings of previous board meetings, but that was not legally possible. So, everyone is obliged to take his word for it.

When there is an unjust campaign against you, you have to speak up, he said. He didn't want to get into mud-slinging, but he feels he has failed by his silence now, because the news was about the situation concerning the Olympic committee.