Hamburg 2024 Bid CEO Nikolas Hill said that the German football scandal over an "alleged slush fund used to get the 2006 World Cup to the country is not helping Hamburg's 2024 Olympic bid ahead of the city referendum next month,"according to Karolos Grohmann of REUTERS. Hamburg is "bidding for the summer Olympics along with Rome, Paris, Budapest and Los Angeles." The IOC will elect the winning bid in '17. The northern port city "will stage a referendum on Nov. 29 to decide whether the bid should go ahead," with officials "confident of a strong support" in favor of the candidacy which will "earn it bonus points" with the IOC. But Hill said that the football scandal "was not doing them any favours." Hill: "Hamburg 2024 stands for utmost transparency, and this is very well received among Hamburg's citizens. All the contracts we have concluded are there for anyone to read in the City of Hamburg transparency portal. Hamburg's citizens have also realized that in recent years the IOC has likewise made a lot of efforts in this regard, especially in the form of the 2020 reform agenda. Nevertheless, the debate about FIFA and the role played by DFB as the German Football Association does not help in the referendum." Hill said that the bid "needed about a quarter of a million 'Yes' votes out of about one million for a quorum" but said that the "majority of citizens were backing the bid." Hill added, "We assume that the majority of Hamburg's citizen supports the candidacy. What will be decisive, however, is that all those in favour actually vote." The German FA (DFB) is "under extreme pressure" after reports of an alleged slush fund with €6.7M used to bribe FIFA officials at the vote in '00 to bring the '06 tournament to Germany (REUTERS, 10/27).
