Former Saenuri Party lawmaker Ierisa, a legend of Korean table tennis and former president of Taereung athletes' village, announced his intention to run for the 41st Korea Sports Hall election held on January 18th next year.
In a phone call with SBS on the 26th, former Congressman Ierisa said, "We are preparing the documents for registration on the 28th, when candidate registration begins."
Former Congressman Ierisa said, "It is best to unify the candidates to prevent the re-election of the current Chairman Lee Ki-heung. One candidate who can meet and confront Chairman Lee Ki-heung must come out. If not, I will independently run for this election.”
Former Congressman Ierisa emphasized the importance of this election, saying, "Currently, Korean sports are in crisis and there is no sense of presence. There must be a drastic change through this presidential election. A new leadership system should be formed to create a new wind and raise the status of sportsmen." I did.
In 1973, former lawmaker Ierisa, who won the world table tennis championship in Sarajevo in 1973, ran for the Korea Sports Center election in 2012, but was defeated by Kim Jong-haeng at the time and was also in the 2016 election, but took fourth place after candidates Lee Ki-heung, Jang Ho-seong and Jeon Byung-gwan.
Currently, the officials who have officially announced their intention to run for the election of the Korea Sports Center are Chairman Ki-heung Lee, Honorary President of Woosuk University Jang Young-dal, Joon-sang Yoo, President of Korea Yacht Association, Professor Shin-wook Kang, Professor of Dankook University, Kang-Ro Yoon, President of International Sports Research Institute, and Dae-Sung Moon, former IOC athlete committee member.
Among them, it is known that Jang Young-dal, honorary president of Woo Seok-dae, turned away from running.
A member of the domestic sports industry said, "The Honorary Chancellor said yesterday (25th) that he would not run for a close acquaintance, and I know that the supporters will persuade him to change the mind of Honorary Chancellor until just before registration."
It seems that the reason why Honorary Chancellor Jang, who showed strong will to run for the athletics venue by holding two press conferences, suddenly changed his decision to no longer run for the election.
Honorary Chancellor Jang, a former member of the Sun National Assembly, was handed over to trial on charges of pre-election campaign during the last presidential election and was sentenced to a final fine of 5 million won by the Supreme Court in 2019.
Honorary Chancellor Jang has emphasized that there is no problem with the candidates for this election according to the interpretation of the votes of the Central Election Commission, but most legal experts view that if the current articles of association of the Korean Sports Association are applied as they are, registration of a candidate is virtually impossible.
Meanwhile, the three officially running for the election of the sports venue, including Yoo Jun-sang, president of the Korea Yacht Association, Kang Shin-wook, Dankook University professor, and Yoon Kang-ro, president of the International Sports Research Institute, agreed to unify the principled candidates on the evening of the 25th of Christmas.
The three agreed that the development of Korean sports could not be expected with the current sports venue system, Lee Ki-heung, and decided to draw a final conclusion before registration on the 28th.
The point of watching this election is whether the remaining candidates can unify and create a one-on-one confrontation against Chairman Ki-heung Lee, who is challenging for re-election.
(Photo = Yonhap News)