The world’s Olympics community was still trickling into the Washington Hilton last Tuesday afternoon, but Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Sabah already declared the week an American victory.
The Kuwaiti international sports power broker — just hours after anointing two front-runners for the FIFA presidency — was celebrating visas and smooth entry into the United States for 1,200 officials from almost every national Olympic committee on earth, including pariah states North Korea and Iran.
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Ahmad, with USOC Chairman Larry Probst, has been open in his praise for the U.S.
Photo by: GETTY IMAGES
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A burly, pony-tailed former OPEC chairman whose casual ease belies his royalty, Ahmad has become one of the most influential men in global sports through his power across FIFA and the International Olympic Committee. Unlike many who try to play his game, Ahmad works to a great degree in public. He believes in laying his ideas on the table.
His idea this particular week, dripping with implications for the U.S. Olympic movement: “People are missing the States, and they want just to have confidence to come back to it,” he said, speaking for many international guests who think post 9/11 security measures and geopolitical rifts make coming to America impossible, dangerous or simply not worth it.
The vote on the 2024 Olympics is still roughly two years away and impossible to predict, but if Los Angeles succeeds in its bid and finally brings the Games back to the United States, Ahmad will deserve a portion of the credit. Perhaps more than any other single foreigner, he’s advocated for the end of the United States’ quasi-banishment from the Olympic fold.
Reminding the world of the American appeal was his primary mission in bringing the Association of National Olympic Committees to Washington for the first time in 21 years last week.
Ahmad is savvy enough to not explicitly support the Los Angeles 2024 bid, and it was hard to discern at times where sincere enthusiasm stopped and innocuous host flattery began. But for several days in Washington last week, he praised the United States to anyone who would listen.
Ahmad met with Los Angeles 2024 bid leaders Casey Wasserman and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti for the first time, charmed International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde at a dinner, and repeatedly addressed U.S. Olympic Committee Chairman Larry Probst on a first-name basis, a minor breach of Olympic protocol.
Ahmad’s ANOC presidency is just one of his many paths to influence. He sits on the FIFA executive committee and is president of the Olympic Council of Asia. He says he may run for the IOC executive board next year. Perhaps most importantly, he chairs the Olympics solidarity commission, which is due to distribute $438 million in Games revenue to the IOC member nations for the 2013-16 quadrennium.
U.S. and Los Angeles officials are grateful he brought ANOC to Washington, but they stop short of calling him an ally.
“I consider him open-minded,” said USOC Chief Executive Officer Scott Blackmun. “And I think the IOC would love to have a more engaged United States, and I think for that reason more than any other they’re very, very happy to have us engaged and bidding and hosting things like this.”
Ahmad rejects the “influencer” label that so often comes to him, preferring to call himself an expert “coordinator.” What’s the difference? Rather than actually holding power himself, he said, he’s leveraged his longevity, relationships and vast footprint across international sports to maximize the power of other individuals and groups.
He first joined FIFA and the IOC in the mid-1990s.
“I have my relations, and I can be a good coordinator,” he said in a soft, scratchy voice, colored by the occasional Marlboro Red. “I just want the benefit of those organizations, and I like to be part of a team.”
That’s a bit like saying Michael Jordan was just part of a team. There may have been more powerful individuals in the Olympic movement over the years, but few have been so open about it. And in Ahmad’s case, that openness has served to augment his position.
Consider a case from fall 2013. Ahmad earned a reprimand from the IOC ethics commission when he openly backed now-President Thomas Bach as a candidate. At the same meeting, he also lobbied for Tokyo to get the 2020 Summer Olympics and for wrestling to stay in the Olympics program.
All three issues won. And, he says today, his choices have been validated by future events.
“Look, my friend, let me tell you something,” he said last week. “I follow a lot of articles about me — ‘kingmaker,’ ‘influencer,’ ‘the man in the jeans and the black sweater’ — but I never found someone saying my resolution was wrong.”
Today, he walks right up to the line when it comes to ethics.
“I have to respect the rules, but I never hide myself behind anything. I always like it to be known where I am.
“I believe whatever is here,” he says, pointing to his left temple, “I put it here,” he adds, pointing to a coffee table, “and discuss it.”
But his power is limited and is one of many factors that will sway the 104 other members of the IOC when awarding the 2024 Games. Can he call his work to ingratiate the United States with the IOC a success if Los Angeles doesn’t win?
“In the end, it’s a competition. We have to accept whatever the resolution is,” he said. “But I think the chemistry of the bid is doing well, because both sides are working very hard, the city and the USOC, and I hope they will continue the race. And I’m sure they will have a fair chance like the others.”
