Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov could become the new president of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC), meaning that the state can assume tighter control over the budget money spent on the Olympics.
The previous president of the ROC handed in his resignation on March 3 after he was asked to by President Dmitry Medvedev in the wake of the poor performance of the Russian team in Vancouver.
In the election of Leonid Tyagachev’s successor, priority will be given not to an athlete, as it had been until now, but to a manager, a source close to the government and the United Russia party told Vedomosti. But at a meeting of the ROC on March 26 in Sochi devoted to summarizing the Vancouver Winter Games, the task of taking first place at the at the Sochi Olympics was set. Second place will be considered a failure, said a committee member. This is the only way to make the Olympic achievements of Russian athletes a matter of national importance, he said.
As part of this ambitious task it was also proposed to give the ROC the right to receive and manage federal budget funds, but it is also necessary to ensure state control over their expenditure, a committee member said.