Coe to face new questions in British parliament

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  • casual obsever
    registered
    4 years ago 01/08/2017 2:55pm CST
    re: Deanouk
    Forum Index
    Deanouk wrote:

    If he was so corrupt then why take the hard stance against Russia, resulting in death threats to him and his family? If he hadn't banned them he'd be damned and criticised, and by banning them he is still being damned. He can't win.

    He was never pro-Russia, but pro-UK, pro-Nike, pro-Paula, pro old-boys-network, anti-transparency, and against criminalization of doping, and always looked out for himself first, see e.g. his lobbying on behalf of (his then employer) Nike to his "spiritual leader" Diack while being his VP (which he denied of course).
    Standing up against Russia helped the UK and his personal and professional reputation. No surprise there.
  • casual obsever
    registered
    4 years ago 01/08/2017 3:02pm CST
    re: Deanouk
    Forum Index
    Deanouk wrote:

    He can't win.

    I would agree with that, at this point.
    He could have won if
    - he stood up against the FIFA corruption as their Ethics Committee Chair
    - he had not lobbied the IAAF on behalf of Nike
    - he had not, at minimum, turned a blind eye towards the IAAF corruption
    - he had voluntarily and promptly quit Nike's position after becoming IAAF President
    - he had refrained from interfering with Paula's investigation
    - he had fought for transparency as IAAF President
    - he had fought for criminalization of doping as IAAF President.
  • The Greatt One
    4 years ago 01/08/2017 3:16pm CST
    re: casual obsever
    Forum Index

    Oh Great Spirit Leader

    http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2015/11/08/22/2E3D85E600000578-3309502-image-a-49_1447020462897.jpg
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/09/2017 7:47am CST
    re: The Greatt One
    Forum Index

    Questioning of Bedford is tomorrow. Slightly more detail here:

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jan/09/sebastian-coe-iaaf-corruption-mps
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 8:01am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index

    Bedford confirms that he told Coe about the obligations on the telephone.

    Coe would not even acknowledge that he had received the email.

    Nor could Bedford get any confirmation of receipt from the ethics committee.

    There are none so blind as those who refuse to see:

    http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/athletics/athletics-corruption-scandal-how-could-sebastian-coe-claim-knew-nothing-iaaf-extortion-racket-a7519476.html

    http://www.nwemail.co.uk/news/national/article/Coe-ignorance-claims-over-athletics-corruption-undermined-by-Bedford-evidence-1b8b6aa1-7e0f-4c86-848f-2edb7fc24a50-ds
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 8:11am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index

    should read "allegations" not obligations.
  • rekrunr
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 8:38am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index

    What is new? Nothing. Just look at the evidence.
    Of course the Lord forwarded the texts like the emails, or it would have been inappropriate.
    Phone calls are irrelevant because the British don't hear so well. That was proven by Sir Mo.
  • wanna live like common people
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 8:59am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index

    As a Lord, he can tell the Commons Committee to fark off

    https://twitter.com/danroan/status/818836413785534464
  • internet
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 8:59am CST
    re: rekrunner
    Forum Index
    rekrunner wrote:

    Reading the subject line would be enough.
    casual obsever wrote:
    But he has claimed that he wasn't aware of the content of this email. This is one of the many occasions where I don't believe him.


    Maybe Dave Bedford did not enter anything into the subject line, or maybe what he had entered in the suject line was different from the content of the email.
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 9:42am CST
    re: wanna live like common people
    Forum Index
    wanna live like common people wrote:

    As a Lord, he can tell the Commons Committee to fark off


    Thanks for posting that. I do not have great knowledge of the UK political system, so I did not know that.

    Probably poor optics to do that, even though it appears that is an option.
  • LetsRun.com
    your benevolent dictator
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 9:51am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index

    Dave Bedford spoke to Parliament today and we've just updated the homepage with what happened. An MP says that Bedford's testimony today 'undermined' Seb Coe's.

    Check out our summary on the front page.

    http://www.letsrun.com/archive/2017/01/10/

    Here are the two article we are linking to.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/athletics/athletics-corruption-scandal-how-could-sebastian-coe-claim-knew-nothing-iaaf-extortion-racket-a7519476.html

    and

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jan/10/sebastian-coe-athletics-corruption-undermined-dave-bedford
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 9:56am CST
    re: LetsRun.com
    Forum Index
    LetsRun.com wrote:

    Dave Bedford spoke to Parliament today and we've just updated the homepage with what happened. An MP says that Bedford's testimony today 'undermined' Seb Coe's.

    Check out our summary on the front page.

    Can you find out when CAS is going to release their decisions in the appeal of the bribery case? (Diack and 2 others)?
  • internet
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 9:57am CST
    re: rekrunner
    Forum Index
    rekrunner wrote:

    In August 2014, when Bedford sent the email to Coe, the extortion of Liliya Shobukhova was already four months into an investigation by the IAAF Ethics Commission. The proper thing for Coe to do would be to forward the email to the IAAF Ethics Commission -- which he did. It would have been inappropriate for Coe to do more, and risk interfering with an on-going investigation.

    Bedford does not seem to think it was the proper thing to do. But maybe this was all part of Coe's altruistic plan to save track and field through becoming IAAF president. Who knows?

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jan/10/sebastian-coe-athletics-corruption-undermined-dave-bedford



    "Earlier, Bedford had said he agreed with the MPs that it was “strange†Coe had forwarded his emails to Beloff as he had not asked him to do so and had already told him that Beloff had the material. He also said it was “without doubt†that Coe knew about the Shobukhova case when they spoke on 21 November, a fortnight before the ARD broadcast.

    When asked for a personal view on why Coe may have chosen to remain, in Nicolson’s words, “wilfully ignorant†of what was happening at the IAAF, Bedford said he thought his compatriot had decided the best way he could help save athletics was to get elected, which effectively meant staying on the right side of Diack."
  • pop_pop!_v2.2.1
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:02am CST
    re: casual obsever
    Forum Index
    casual obsever wrote:

    Deanouk wrote:

    He can't win.

    I would agree with that, at this point.
    He could have won if
    - he stood up against the FIFA corruption as their Ethics Committee Chair
    - he had not lobbied the IAAF on behalf of Nike
    - he had not, at minimum, turned a blind eye towards the IAAF corruption
    - he had voluntarily and promptly quit Nike's position after becoming IAAF President
    - he had refrained from interfering with Paula's investigation
    - he had fought for transparency as IAAF President
    - he had fought for criminalization of doping as IAAF President.


    All of which means fewer opportunities for IAAF/IOC members to monetize their positions.

    The head of the Judo federation actually publicly stated that the IOC sports needed to clean up a couple of years ago. That lead to his swift removal from IOC committees.
  • Primo Numero Uno
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:10am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index
    Mr. Obvious wrote:

    This was already investigated once.

    Of course Coe said he knew nothing and didn't even need to read the email to find out what was in it and forward it along to the appropriate authorities.

    I did not find that "explanation" very credible. Neither did numerous MPs. Several of them all but accused Coe of perjury (taking into account Britain's very harsh laws on such things, the calls were muted but unmistakable).

    The new development is that they are going to call Dave Bedford again. They are going to ask him more questions and get more answer to potentially call Lord Coe again.

    You are an idiot. Coe doped in his day and now we've got an ex doper in charge covering up the scandals.
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:13am CST
    re: rojo
    Forum Index
    rojo wrote:

    Deanouk wrote:

    Unfortunately, there are several posters on here who want to se Coe fail. Never mind all the good work he has done and sticking to his guns re banning Russia, something the IOC didn't have the balls to do.

    If he was so corrupt then why take the hard stance against Russia, resulting in death threats to him and his family? If he hadn't banned them he'd be damned and criticised, and by banning them he is still being damned. He can't win.

    As D. Pound stated at the time, Coe is the best man to deal with the situation.

    You raise some good points. I mean when I read today's articles, I initially was going to put above the QOD, "Did Seb Coe lie to Parliament?" but then went for the nuanced, "Seb Coe has some explaining to do.'"

    It's pretty clear that Seb Coe did know the IAAF was screwed up berfore the German ARD report came out. I imagine if he goes back to testify, he'll say he didn't know the full scope of scandal until the report came out and thus won't be caught technically in a lie.



    My opinion remains basically unchanged by this. Coe was either willfully ignorant as a VP of the IAAF (and FIFA ethics commission) or he is lying. Dishonest or incompetent those are the choices.

    I tend to lean towards lying, as it appears Coe has no essential problem with trading on his membership on the IAAF (FIFA, BOC, IOC, etc.) for profit. It just has to get laundered a little bit more. This is shown by his willingness to continue to be an ambassador for Nike and by his ownership interest in CSM/Chime. The whole point of Chime is to trade on Lord Coe's connections, its a feature, not a bug. There is a much bigger story here for some enterprising investigative journalist.
  • rojo
    cofounder
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:27am CST
    re: rojo
    Forum Index

    The articles we have linked to have both been updated. Coe has now said he won't testify again.

    I really liked this excerpt from the Sean Ingle article in the Guardian. Dave Bedford basically is making my point for me.

    Ingle wrote:

    The SNP MP John Nicolson suggested to Bedford that given Coe had been brought in to clean up athletics, his lack of curiosity about corruption was “extraordinaryâ€. In his reply Bedford suggested that Coe might have been playing the long game, waiting to see if he could get elected in August 2015 so that he could make significant changes to the IAAF.

    “If you look at what has happened subsequently to him being elected to a position of power, there are clear implications that he wants the integrity of our sport brought back and he has made significant steps towards that happening,†he added.

    “I think that it might be true that he decided that the best way he could help the sport was to make sure that he got elected as president, because if it didn’t happen then there was no future for the sport.â€
  • Mr. Obvious
    registered
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:51am CST
    re: wanna live like common people
    Forum Index
    wanna live like common people wrote:

    As a Lord, he can tell the Commons Committee to fark off

    A theoretical question, as I am not so familiar with UK political system:

    Could Coe potentially face perjury charges for his previous testimony?

    I'm not suggesting he would, as I think the bar is pretty high to such a thing, just wondering if that is a theoretical possibility.
  • rojo
    cofounder
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 10:57am CST
    re: Deanouk
    Forum Index
    Deanouk wrote:

    Unfortunately, there are several posters on here who want to se Coe fail. Never mind all the good work he has done and sticking to his guns re banning Russia, something the IOC didn't have the balls to do.

    If he was so corrupt then why take the hard stance against Russia, resulting in death threats to him and his family? If he hadn't banned them he'd be damned and criticised, and by banning them he is still being damned. He can't win.

    As D. Pound stated at the time, Coe is the best man to deal with the situation.

    You raise some good points. I mean when I read today's articles, I initially was going to put above the QOD, "Did Seb Coe lie to Parliament?" but then went for the nuanced, "Seb Coe has some explaining to do.'"

    The article we were linking to was totally changed so we've changed the QOD as well.

    It's pretty clear that Seb Coe did know the IAAF was screwed up berfore the German ARD report came out. I imagine if he goes back to testify, he'll say he didn't know the full scope of scandal until the report came out and thus won't be caught in a lie

    I don't have the transcript of his testimony in 2015 so i don't know for sure what he said (Update: Weldon found some stuff and the key word I think is "scale"), but I did find it interesting that in Sean Ingle's column today before the hearing he wrote the following, "In December 2015 Coe appeared to indicate to the culture, media and sport select committee." See how he used the word appeared. So I don't think they'll get him in a flat out lie.

    They'll get a politician being a politician.

    Should we be outraged? Maybe, but waht does that accomplish? Should we want him fired? I dont' think so.

    "I think the question we need to be asking is, "Is it good or bad for the sport if Coe falls on his sword?" It kind of seems right now we have the perfect scenario - if he stays. Why? He's a very high profile guy, who has a lot of connections, with big business experience but one who will be under enormous pressure to do the right thing on doping.

    If random person "John Doe" was the head of the IAAF would he be testifying before Parliament? No they would not.

    I'm pretty damn confident if I was in Coe's shoes, I wouldn't have acted like he did. But then again, I would have never been political enough to rise to VP of the IAAF in the first place as you have to kiss too many butts. But couldn't one say, "He realized he absolutely had to get elected to save the sport and to do so he had to try to publicly kiss Diack's butt?"

    Imagine if Sergey Bubka had been elected to head the IAAF instead of Coe. We'd basically have Russia in charge. Remember, Bubka is a pro-Russian person from Ukraine - which is pretty unusual.

    Politics is messy my friends. I think Coe getting grilled but staying may be the best scenario. Then again, I can understand it if people are just tired of the excuses we make for those in charge of the sports we love.

    http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/others/inside-lines-sergei-bubka-s-appeal-for-peace-sits-uneasily-with-his-russian-ties-9162907.html
  • rojo
    cofounder
    4 years ago 01/10/2017 11:01am CST
    re: Mr. Obvious
    Forum Index
    Mr. Obvious wrote:

    wanna live like common people wrote:

    As a Lord, he can tell the Commons Committee to fark off

    A theoretical question, as I am not so familiar with UK political system:

    Could Coe potentially face perjury charges for his previous testimony?

    I'm not suggesting he would, as I think the bar is pretty high to such a thing, just wondering if that is a theoretical possibility.


    I don't think so.

    My brother Weldon sent me the following email which should answer your questions pretty well.


    Weldon wrote:

    I think the key word is "scale".

    http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/general/athletics/athletics-corruption-scandal-how-could-sebastian-coe-claim-knew-nothing-iaaf-extortion-racket-a7519476.html

    ""Despite the many attempts made to reach him by Bedford, Coe – who
    was vice-president of the IAAF at the time - told the committee in
    December 2015 that he had been entirely unaware of the scale of the
    corruption within the organisation until a series of revelations from
    German broadcaster ARD were broadcast in December 2014."

    same article, "administrator Dave Bedford contradicted his own claim
    to the MPs that he had no idea about the scale of corruption within
    the body,"

    Scale is subjective.

    I think the other article sums up his possible motivations.

    This article says:

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2017/jan/10/sebastian-coe-athletics-corruption-undermined-dave-bedford

    "“I think that it might be true that he decided that the best way he
    could help the sport was to make sure that he got elected as
    president, because if it didn’t happen then there was no future for
    the sport.â€"

    Where did we get the headline, "*Independent: Texts, an email and a
    mountain phone call – how could Sebastian Coe claim he knew nothing of
    IAAF extortion racket?"

    No where does the article say Seb he knew nothing. It says he didn't
    know the scale.

    Right after Bedford spoke, all of the snap recaps were acting like he said Coe lied. Now everything is being changed to be more nuanced. Weldon's email explains why.