Italian PM Matteo Renzi launched a bid on Monday to bring the 2024 summer Olympic Games to Rome, presenting it as a “boost for the country as the capital reels from a corruption scandal and the economy flounders,” according to Isla Binnie of REUTERS. Italy is the second country after Germany to officially launch a bidding process that will cost less than in previous years after the IOC agreed to “shoulder part of the budget.” The prospect of paying for the event, which cost its last host city London roughly £9B, was “quickly met with opposition from some corners in a country” heading for its third straight year of recession. In an open letter to the premier rejecting the idea of spending money on a sporting event while Italians were "being asked to make sacrifices," Italian consumer association ADUC wrote, "Olympics 2024 in Rome? No thanks!" After the bid announcement, Italian journalist Leonardo Metalli tweeted, "This way we don't have to think about the mafia in Rome any more. Long live the Olympics! Don't steal the rings” (REUTERS, 12/15). In London, James Politi reported the proposal “shrugs off criticism that Italy cannot afford to host the games.” Skeptics also noted that Renzi’s announcement comes “only two weeks after the emergence of a corruption scandal in the Eternal City.” More than €200M ($249M) of assets were seized and 37 people arrested in connection with a “Mafia-like network of kickbacks” on public contracts and services in Italy’s capital. Renzi said there should be “no limits to the country’s confidence” in itself. Renzi: “Too often our country seems resigned … You can lose but it’s unacceptable to refuse to play the game. We have all we need to shoot for the gold.” Online polls published both in La Gazzetta dello Sport and La Repubblica suggested Italians were “overwhelmingly sceptical” of the idea. Matteo Salvini, the leader of Northern League, the anti-euro, anti-immigrant party that is one of Renzi’s harshest critics, described the plan as a “folly.” Salvini: “I think he’s living on another planet” (FINANCIAL TIMES, 12/15).
ALL ROADS LEAD TO ROME: The AFP reported Renzi said Rome would be the centerpiece of the Games bid but that "all the cities, from Florence and Naples to Sardinia" could be involved. Renzi said, “We don't intend to simply participate in the bidding process, this is a challenge we would like to win. We will do everything we can until 2017 when the final decision is made.” Rome is the first city to officially announce it will bid for the 2024 Games, but the “Eternal City can expect a tough competition.” The USOC is to decide this week between L.A., San Francisco, Boston or Washington, D.C. for a probable American bid. The German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) this month "voted unanimously to bid to host" the 2024 or 2028 Summer Games, with Berlin or Hamburg as the host city. Paris is to decide in January “whether to stage a bid and the Azerbaijan capital, Baku, and Doha -- both beaten by Tokyo in the bid to host the 2020 Games -- are potential candidates” (AFP, 12/15).
