Tokyo – The suggestion issued by President Donald Trump, about postponing the Olympic Games for a year before the coronavirus pandemic, was immediately dismissed by the Japanese minister in charge of organizing that sporting event.
“Neither the IOC nor the organizing committee contemplate the cancellation or postponement. Absolutely not”, Seiko Hashimoto, Olympic bronze medalist, says during a press conference in Tokyo
The International Olympic Committee and the organizers of Tokyo 2020 have maintained the same position for three months, when the outbreak of the new virus emerged in China. The disease spread later in Asia and then throughout the world.
And the insistent message has been: The Olympic Games will open on July 24, as scheduled.
“I just can’t see that there are no people there. In other words, no people are allowed,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Thursday. “Maybe, and this is just my idea, this should be suspended for a year.”
Big television networks and sponsors have invested billions of dollars in the Olympic Games. And the saturated international sports calendar seems to leave little room to postpone the jousts for a year.
The idea of running the Games without an audience, or simply canceling them, has slipped, something that has happened only in the World Wars.
“The best thing we can do, so that athletes do not face confusion or uncertainty, is to do our best”said Hashimoto, who competed in four Winter Olympics in speed skating. He obtained bronze in 1992 and participated in three summer Olympic editions as a cyclist.
A cancellation or postponement would have countless consequences, affecting sponsors, television, 11,000 Olympic athletes, 4,400 Paralympians, employees, airlines, and hotels. It would imply a loss of $ 1 billion in tickets already sold for the different competitions.
And it would affect 80,000 volunteers, who would miss out on a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help organize the Games.
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