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FC to discuss Olympics results with sport officials on March 31
According to him, the senators and governmental officials will discuss “the causes for the failures of the Russian national team in Vancouver and the preparations to the Sochi Olympics.”
Alongside, Torshin did not specify who will speak up for the senators from the Sports Ministry.
The State Duma has earlier scheduled a question-and-answer government session on April 7, when the sports minister and the president of the Russian Olympic Committee should report on the Olympics results.
The Vancouver Olympics became the most unsuccessful for Russia in the entire history of Russia’s participation in the Olympics. The Russian national team won just three gold medals (two in biathlon and one in the ski race) getting the 11th place in the medal count.
President Dmitry Medvedev urged to draw conclusions from so unsuccessful results, including reshuffles among the sports officials. On March 1, at a meeting with the United Russia leadership the president stated that “those who bear responsibility for the preparation to the Olympics, should be brought to responsibility right now.” “The sports officials will have to take a definite decision and to tender resignation. If they fail to do it, we will help them,” he pledged.
Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov is also confident in the need for the dismissals of sport officials. “In the West an official can be found not guilty for some specific situation, but bears responsibility absolutely for all in his agency and resigns,” he said on Wednesday.
Alongside, Mironov noted that “the problem cannot be resolved just through dismissals.” He believes that it is necessary to take a range of measures to change the situation in the training of our athletes, primarily taking into account children’s sport schools. “Most parents cannot pay for sport studies of their children,” the Federation Council speaker said.
In this respect, the state “should decide definitely on the health of the nation,” in this case “it is possible to find a thread that will help to untangle the whole scope of difficulties,” he said.
Federation Council Vice-Speaker Svetlana Orlova is confident that “Russia should win in the Sochi Olympics national standings,” therefore, what happened to our team in Vancouver “cannot be left unnoticed, without the general discussion at various levels.”
She offered to discuss the situation “without giving labels, to speak about it with the State Duma deputies, members of the government and sport organizations.” To this effect, it was decided to set up a joint working group, Orlova specified.
The chairman of the Federation Council Physical Culture Committee and the former chief of the Russian sports watchdog, Vyacheslav Fetisov offered “to look into the roots of the problem” and pledged that the committee “will deal with everything that happened to the invitations of officials concerned.”
Alongside, the senator noted that “the state takes every effort to develop sports and the Olympic movement, the system is laid down.” He emphasized recently that “many sport facilities were built, the Olympic movement revived, the Olympic reserve has taken the leading places in the medal count in all kinds of sports for the three past years.”
Fetisov is the two-time Olympic ice hockey champion did not want to dwell on the poor performance of the Russian ice hockey national team in Vancouver on Wednesday, but admitted that he “was feeling uneasy in Canada, people were sympathizing with the Russians, and it is shameful.”
For his part, a member of the committee Amir Gallyamov stressed “the absolutely indecent behavior” of many accompanying officials, particularly artists, noting that he witnessed “the bacchanalia” at the Russian House in Vancouver. “It is necessary to convene of officials concerned and to discuss why these people, including movie actors, arrived in Canada, for the money of whom, and to discuss their behavior, the senator said.
A member of the committee and the former player of the Russian national mini-football team, Konstantin Yeremenko affirmed that neither Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko (the former senator) nor President of the Russian Olympic Committee Leonid Tyagachev, which is current a senator from the Rostov region, did not attend any meeting of the Federation Council specific committee, though Tyagachev is the deputy chairman of the committee.