A "stoush has erupted between Rio de Janeiro's mayor and the Australian Olympic Committee over an athlete ban that has offended the leader of the Games' host city," according to Samantha Lane of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD.
Clearly fed up with a "sense of negativity he has detected for some time," Rio Mayor Eduardo Paes hit back at the AOC for being "a source of aggressions to Brazil."
Paes said, "There is a lot of ignorance about Rio and Brazil, a certain drama of how things are."
The comments "follow the AOC's move to ban all Australian team members from visiting Rio's favelas during Games time in August." The history of the tension, however, "points back to an observation" of AOC President and IOC VP John Coates, who in April '14 declared that Rio was "the worst" city he'd seen in terms of its Olympic preparations at the time.
While the AOC "is steadfast on what it says is an entirely appropriate team safety measure," it moved to clarify its position. AOC Media Chief Mike Tancred said, "He [Paes] has taken it the wrong way. We didn't mean to upset him. It was not intended to be a slur against the people of Brazil. It's just a security question for our team and it's nothing more than that." The AOC "is taking advice from the same security expert, Greg Nance, who guided the team in London four years ago."
The AOC accepts that "it cannot control the movements of every athlete or team official" and said that a team member that chose to flout the favela directive would not be punished.
Tancred said, "We're saying that officially they're off limits. It's a security risk and we can't guarantee their security if they go to a favela on their own" (SMH, 2/24). The AP reported Rio’s favelas "are among the most violent areas of the city but they also attract thousands of visitors on formal and informal tours." In recent years, some foreigners "have chosen to stay in the safer favelas because of the high price of accommodation near the beaches" (AP, 2/25). REUTERS' Ian Ransom wrote Tancred said Australian athletes would "certainly engage with the residents of Rio and they will join in the fun on Copa beach" (REUTERS, 2/24).
