Christian Wulff will head the search committee of the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) to determine the new leadership of the sports roof association.

According to information from the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the retired Federal President recently gave his approval.

The spokesman for the central associations in the DOSB, Ingo Weiss, confirmed this on Thursday afternoon on request: "It is true, we are happy to have won such an excellent expert on the sport in the form of the former Federal President to lead this task."

Anno Hecker

Responsible editor for sports.

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Michael Reinsch

Correspondent for sports in Berlin.

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Together with the chairwoman of the associations for special tasks in the DOSB, Barbara Öttinger, and the spokesman for the state sports associations, Jörg Ammon, Weiss put together the selection committee. It is necessary to establish it because DOSB President Alfons Hörmann announced that he would be withdrawing from the general assembly at the beginning of December. This was preceded by a recommendation from the DOSB's ethics committee in the spring to the presidium to face a vote of confidence by means of a new election. The committee, headed by former Federal Minister of the Interior Thomas de Maizière, investigated the allegations in an anonymously formulated letter, which is said to have come from employees of the DOSB. In the letter, Hörmann is made responsible for a “climate of fear” in the DOSB. According to its own account, the ethics committee was unable to determineWhether concrete allegations are true, however, determined a great distrust of the DOSB leadership.

Wulff, who was already fond of the sport in his time as Lower Saxony's Prime Minister, will receive support from seven other people of high standing. This includes Verena Bentele, a disabled athlete who was awarded twelve gold medals at the Paralympics. She is president of the largest German social association VdK. From 2014 to 2018 she worked as the Federal Government's Commissioner for the Disabled. The economist and sociologist Prof. Veronika Grimm is a renowned climate economist, belongs to the group of economists and is considered to be sport-loving. The President of the Central Council of Catholics, Stefan Sternberg, has also accepted. The circle around Wulff will also include Kirsten Hasenpusch, Chief Financial Officer of the German Sports Youth. Barbara Öttinger (President of the German Aikido Association) comes from the inner circle of the DOSB,Jörg Ammon (President of the Bavarian State Sports Association) and Weiss (President of the German Basketball Association).

In view of this compilation it seems certain that Ammon and Weiss, who were said to be interested in the successor to Hörmann, will not be available for a DOSB presidency this year. The search committee should be constituted in the next few weeks. An agency takes over the management. As can be heard, efforts are being made to persuade the entire Presidium to resign in order to make it easier for a candidate of stature to start with their own team. So far, only Hörmann and Vice President Kaweh Niroomand have announced their withdrawal. The term of office of the current honorary leadership does not end until December 2022.