IOC scandal forces Sydney into $48.5 million cuts

IOC scandal forces Sydney into $48.5 million cuts

SYDNEY (Reuters): Organizers of the 2000 Sydney Olympics took an axe to the Games' budget on Thursday, blaming the IOC corruption scandal for putting off potential sponsors.

They also chose to save Britain's Queen Elizabeth the cost of trip to her distant dominion by deciding that Prime Minister John Howard should declare the Games open and not Australia's foreign head of state.

Michael Knight, president of organizing committee SOCOG, announced cuts totaling US$48.5 million to the Games operating budget and said the Salt Lake City IOC vote-buying scandal had definitely put off potential sponsors.

"Over the last few months the focus that has been, in the media and elsewhere, on the IOC has left us with a period where it was incredibly difficult to get out and pitch for sponsors," Knight said after a meeting of the SOCOG board.

Unlike 2002 host Salt Lake City, Sydney has not lost any existing sponsors because of the IOC scandal. But it has now had to scale back its marketing targets.

The Games' overall sponsorship target has been cut by $32.3 million to $526.5 million of which $110 million still has to be found.

That cut means the overall Games' expenditure budget will be will be cut to $1.65 billion.

SOCOG also decided to boost its contingency fund by $16.2 million to $94.5 million. That $16.2 million will have to be found from other parts of the budget.

Overall the Games will still cost some $3.9 billion, including an estimated $1.5 billion of public money being spent on sports facilities, transport links and other infrastructure projects by New South Wales state.

SOCOG chief executive Sandy Hollway would not say where exactly the axe might fall, but said the cuts would not affect Sydney's ability to put on top-class Games.

"It means doing very, very well the must-dos, and doing away with some of the nice-to-dos," he said.

SOCOG's decision to let the prime minister open the Games, a point on which Howard himself has long insisted, comes as no surprise. Howard is an avowed monarchist but has been among those arguing that the Games should be opened by an Australian.

Australians are due to vote in a referendum this November on whether to cut more than two centuries of ties with Britain and become a republic with a president.

The Games will be opened by the president if one is elected before the opening ceremony on Sept. 15 -- but Howard's government has already said that there will be no president until January 2001, when Australia celebrates the centenary of its nationhood.

Howard has already invited Queen Elizabeth to make a trip to Australia in early 2000, well before the Games, and Knight said Buckingham Palace had indicated "informally" that she was not interested in coming back for the Olympics.

The only alternative to the choice of Howard would have been Governor-General Sir William Deane, a former Australian High Court judge who is Queen Elizabeth's representative in the former British colony.

"Approximately four billion people will watch the opening ceremony on television," Knight said in a written proposal to the SOCOG board.

"While many would be familiar with the concept of a queen, president or prime minister, relatively few would appreciate the significance of a governor-general."