IOC summit: Constructive, but insufficient, NADOs say

This weekend’s IOC summit and its following declaration had “positive aspects”, says the Institute of National Anti-Doping Agencies (iNADO) in a press release, but these aspects were “overshadowed by several troubling omissions”, says the member organisations of national anti-doping agencies.

The IOC held its 5^th Olympic Summit this weekend and concluded it by sending out a declaration with a list of recommendations for the international anti-doping agency WADA’s upcoming reform.

The IOC’s recommendations for WADA include more independence, harmonisation, transparency and good governance, increased security, financing and strengthening of governance.

But while iNADO finds the IOC recommendations constructive, they are “not sufficient” enough to live up to the IOC’s declared ambition of protecting clean athletes as an absolute priority, says the statement from iNADO.

“The International Olympic Committee’s track record since the release of the McLaren Report has only confounded the global anti-doping system. With this latest Declaration, the IOC only comes part way to restoring its credibility for the clean athletes of the world,” says Joseph de Pencier, CEO of iNADO.

INADO specifically points to the fact that the McLaren report and the doping scandal in Russian sport were not addressed in the declaration, neither were the cyber-attacks by Russian hacker group Fancy Bears.

“WADA welcomes all constructive proposals aimed at reinforcing clean sport,” said WADA president Sir Craig Reedie, in a statement. “Today’s Summit was one more stop on our road to strengthening WADA and the global anti-doping system.”   

“The recommendations that were put forward today will be considered along with others that we have received from stakeholders on such key topics as: WADA’s governance and funding model; consequences for non-compliance; investigations; and testing,” Reedie said.

WADA is holding a Foundation Board meeting on 20 November this year where the path to reform will be up for discussion.