SailJuice Blog

The vote in Qingdao brings to a close a fraught six months for members of ISAF Executive and Council. ISAF president Goran Petersson was outraged at the levels of abuse that had been levelled at him and some of his colleagues, following the controversial vote in Estoril.

As far as Petersson was concerned, justice and democracy were served last November, and that unfortunate choice of wording, the move to ‘reaffirm’, showed just how strongly he and ISAF Executive wanted the Estoril decision to stand. They must be mighty relieved at the way the vote worked out today.

Petersson said that because of the personal abuse that some members had been subjected to, the voting procedure earlier today would take place under a secret ballot. This is an unfortunate, but understandable, move. It makes individuals a good deal less accountable… Read the rest

This weekend is crunch time in Qingdao. All multihull fanatics wait to see what ISAF Council decides this weekend in China, if indeed the Olympic Events for Weymouth 2012 will come up for reconsideration.

ISAF’s decision not to publish the 15 submissions on this topic from national authorities and class associations was disappointing, another sign that the Federation would prefer this whole nasty business to go away without further debate.

Anyway, hopefully the 40-odd members of ISAF Council have informed themselves of the many issues that swirl around this complex debate. And hopefully the individual members will bear in mind their statutory duty laid down in ISAF’s own regulations. That is, to act in the best interests of the sport as a whole, rather than putting nationalistic medal hopes before any other consideration, as we saw in Estoril last November.… Read the rest