The public hearing of the Bundestag Committee for Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid on "Sport and Human Rights" this Wednesday without the participation of the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) and the German Football Association (DFB), the largest sports organizations in the country, is also incomprehensible in the House of Representatives encountered
“We agree within the sports committee that we see this very critically.
We have to work more closely together on such an important topic," says Fritz Güntzler, chairman of the Union faction in the sports committee of the German Bundestag: "As a sports politician, I am missing important sports policy players on the list of experts for this hearing."
Michael Reinsch
Correspondent for sports in Berlin.
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Especially against the background of the upcoming football World Cup in Qatar and the past Olympic Winter Games in Beijing, a hearing on this topic could not take place without the DFB and DOSB.
The sports committee meets at the same time and deals with the top-class sports reform.
The chair of the human rights committee, the FDP MP Renata Alt, justifies the absence of the associations with limited opportunities.
"As was the case with public hearings in the past, each political group could only invite a limited number of experts," she said.
“For this reason, we were not able to take into account all the actors relevant to the topic when making our selection.
Nevertheless, we have tried to the best of our conscience to consider different perspectives, vitae and experiences in order to enable a differentiated and lively discussion.”
Michael Brand, the responsible spokesman for the CDU and CSU parliamentary group, argues much more aggressively.
“This particular hearing is about human rights in sport, not sport organization.
That's why, after a thorough analysis, we invited those representatives of top-class sport who have a profile and are strong in terms of content," he replies when asked.
"The hearing is about as many facts as possible, not about as much lobbying as possible."
"You are part of the problem"
Among those affected and observers there is a lot of criticism of the attitude of the large sports lobby associations, which is often only oriented towards events and profits.
This means they could not be the first choice for a Bundestag hearing on human rights in sport.
"They are part of the problem and the hearing is about possible solutions for the future," says Brand.
“In a committee meeting this year, they only took a very evasive position.
In this respect, it is only logical to look for an exchange of content with other leading sports organizations.” Brand refers to a meeting to which Thomas Weikert, the internationally experienced sports official who was elected DOSB President in December, joined from Beijing during the Winter Games was.
On Wednesday, experts are to have their say on the role of sport in major events in countries that repeatedly violate human rights.
The focus should be on the experiences during the Winter Games in Beijing and developments in Qatar, for example with a view to the connection between the World Cup and fatal accidents on the stadium construction sites.
The DOSB believes that it could have contributed to this.
Nevertheless, he tried to de-escalate the situation on Tuesday.
"We welcome the fact that the Committee for Human Rights and Humanitarian Aid is dedicating itself to sport on Wednesday, because the new DOSB Presidium also put human rights on its agenda in one of its first official acts on March 18 and decided that a concept should be developed how a new Values Advisory Board can help in the future to translate values into attitude and concrete action," said DOSB CEO Torsten Burmester.
"This advisory board should also provide advice and orientation on the important issue of human rights." The topic must be permanently on the agenda with the aim of changing the award criteria across the board: "We would have liked to have presented the position and plans of German sport in the committee.
We should catch up on that at the next opportunity.”