Julio Ramírez Mora has publicly expressed his discomfort with the formation of the Organizing Committee for the 2025 Bolivarian Games, whose realization in Guayaquil is uncertain.

“They believed that Danilo Carrera, being the brother-in-law of Guillermo Lasso, would win the position of president of the Ecuador Olympic Committee, and between Sebastián Palacios and the provincial leader they prepared a badly made budget,” says the COE

The President of the Ecuadorian Triathlon Federation and member of the COE Executive Committee criticized the expansion, without the prior knowledge of other officials, of the integration of the Organizing Committee through official COE channels. He also expressed regret that Roberto Ibáñez, president of the Guayasa Sports Federation, was not included in that list.

‘Sebastián Palacios says the Ecuadorian Olympic Committee wants to overthrow the government of Guillermo Lasso? He is a minister of little importance,’ replies the COE

In chat with the portal Ecuadorian sports, Ramírez Mora called on Delgado to convene an “urgent meeting of the Executive Committee.” According to the presenter, “there is a real very serious problem at the international level with the Organizing Committee that was announced by John Zambrano (COE Secretary General) and that we did not approve.”

Sebastián Palacios: ‘Can I take over the Bolivarian Games in Guayaquil?’

Julio Ramirez Mora. Photo: File

Still without government approval

Last Tuesday, the COE reported that “The Organizing Committee for the Guayaquil 2025 Bolivarian Games has already been formed and consists of the President of the COE, the Secretary General of the Organization, the Minister of Sports, the Prefect of Guayas, the Mayor of Guayaquil (both officials will assume their duties on May 14), the Mayor of the Samborondóna, athlete representative, representative of the business sector.

The statement added that “COE, as the body responsible for the pre-Odebo competition, continues to wait for the national government to send a letter of consent stating the budget that the state commits to the organization of this major international multi-event sport”.

The organization led by Delgado recalled in its newsletter that according to Article 51, Chapter Ten, Odebo Regulations, “The Olympic Committee of the host city (in this case Ecuadorian) will appoint an Organizing Committee with the number of members you deem necessary. (…) It must chaired by the president whose appointment must be approved by the Executive Board of Odeb”.

Lawsuit against the Delegate

Ramírez Mora protests: “We agreed that a point of view would be presented to us in order to analyze the issue as an Executive Committee, but that resolution that was published, and I don’t know by whose order it was published, was not approved by the Executive Committee of the COE. It worries me because these are very important resolutions and in the legislation of this country, a criminal offense can be committed by an act and an omission”.

In his conversation with the website Ecuador Sports, Ramírez Mora complained about the behavior of Jorge Delgado. “I called the president of the COE and he is not kind enough to respond to the suggestions I made to him. We are asking for an urgent meeting of the Executive Committee to show us the minutes, because the members of the Executive Committee are being asked about the announcement (about the Organizing Committee) and nobody knows anything. It’s John Zambrano’s resolution, because everyone else is out of the country.”

The former micro-tennis player from Rio de Janeiro continued his claim regarding the Organizing Committee of the Bolivarians: “It is my moral obligation to declare that inappropriate things are being done, which are not subject to the COE statute. We haven’t met, nothing has been resolved, and suddenly, out of the blue, a post comes out. I asked the COE press officer (César Torres Tinajero) and he told me that the Secretary General ordered him to publish”.

About Ibanez

As for the absence of Ibáñez on the payroll, that’s what Ramírez Mora said about the president of Fedeguayas.

“We understand it badly. We concluded that it is time for this impasse to end, that it is time for dialogue to prevail a little; at that time we left the structure – with Roberto Rojas and Denis Dau – from the organizing committee. Later, it was not known what was approved in the first instance and then, logically, the Organizing Committee could not be appointed. This is harmful to the development of the Bolivarian Games,” said Ramírez Mora.

‘He left Guayaquil on a ship’

In an interview with EL UNIVERSO, John Zambrano said that the COE did not receive a written confirmation that Guillermo Lasso, the President of the Republic, guarantees the budget for the realization of Bolivarian in Guayaquil in 2025. The Secretary General of the COE also clarified that the Organizing Committee for the formal start of work must first have, at the behest of Odeb, a guarantee that the national government has not yet provided.

“We will arrive on time if we run, if they stop putting up obstacles and if the budget is guaranteed. But so far not even $24 million is guaranteed,” said Zambrano, who said the said amount came from “a poorly made budget between Sebastián Palacios and the provincial leader (Ibáñez),” as $51 million is needed to earn the Bolivarians in Guayaquil, 2025.

Despite the fact that Odebo establishes that each country’s Olympic Committees must request the Bolivarian headquarters for the 2025 edition, Fedeguayas did so. Odebo did not respect his own regulations.

“Looking for a headquarters is something that occurred to a person who did not have the competence for it and leaves the whole city on board. As COE, we demand a meeting with the President of the Republic so that he knows things as they are, not as the minister proposes,” Zambrano said in EL UNIVERS last Tuesday. (D)