If there is one exchange that "sums up the relationship between the Australian Olympic Committee and a little-known company that has long controlled the rights to sell and market the Olympic brand in Australia," it comes in a leaked email from AOC President John Coates, according to Mark Hawthorne of the SYDNEY MORNING HERALD. Asked by a staffer last February if his right-hand man, Mike Tancred, would be comfortable with "dollar values" of an advertising package being provided to vitamins firm Swisse, Coates' reply was "blunt." He wrote, "Do not let this get in the way of a deal -- it's chicken shit. And do not worry about Mike T [Tancred] being happy. If I'm happy, he's happy." Since '86, a company called Sports Marketing and Management has "held the exclusive rights to market the Olympic brand in Australia." Over the years, SMAM has earned tens of millions of dollars, "taking a cut of every Olympic sponsorship deal for the past 30 years." The relationship between SMAM and the AOC has "rarely been reviewed." Now a challenge to Coates for the AOC presidency by former Hockeyroo Danni Roche has "shone a spotlight on the AOC's dealings." Roche has called for a "line-by-line audit of the AOC," and she said that she believes Australia's athletes and sporting bodies "should get a greater share of the AOC's revenue." Documents reveal that Coates "was a founding director and company secretary" of SMAM in '86, the year after he became VP of the AOC. He was appointed alongside his friends and associates Phil Coles and Geoff Henke. Immediately after Coates was appointed to the board of SMAM, it was "granted the exclusive rights to negotiate sponsorship deals on behalf of the AOC." Coates remained a SMAM director until '89, "just months before he assumed the AOC presidency" (SMH, 4/23). ABC's Tracey Holmes reported death threats, bullying, intimidation and blackmail -- that is "what Australia's most senior Olympic official is dealing with two weeks out from an election in which he hopes to retain his position." Coates is "facing questions about allegations that his most trusted soldier," Tancred, has had "numerous formal and non-formal workplace bullying complaints made against him." There has been a call for NSW Minister for Innovation & Better Regulations Matt Kean to "personally investigate" after allegations Tancred "threatened to kill one of his staff" (ABC, 4/22).
EXECS BACK ROCHE: In Sydney, Le Grand & Deutrom reported two of Australia's "most influential corporate leaders" are backing Roche to "topple" Coates. Ann Sherry and Leigh Clifford, "prominent" company directors with a direct involvement in Olympic sport, said that "there is a need for change at the top of the AOC to force cultural change and governance reform" at the organization Coates has run for 27 years. Sherry, the former CEO of Bank of Melbourne who was voted "the most influential woman in Australian business," said that she was "dismayed by reports" that former AOC CEO Fiona de Jong quit her post "amid bullying and harassment allegations." Sherry said, "People thought she was very capable and found her straightforward to deal with. It says that something is wrong inside the organization when good people leave." Clifford, a director of Equestrian Australia and the chair of Qantas, a "longstanding" sponsor of the Australian Olympic team, said that the case was "now clear." He said, "I have listened to both candidates and I have concluded it is time for a change" (THE AUSTRALIAN, 4/24).