“Never before in the 56-year history of the Paralympic Games have we faced circumstances like this”, said IPC president Sir Philip Craven.
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A budget shortfall and low ticket sales for next month’s Paralympics in Rio will mean fewer venues and staff, the president of the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) says.
The IPC hopes travel grants which had been due in July will be paid, but it is feared some nations may struggle to make it to Rio.
So to all the athletes who do make it to Rio, good luck!
Yesterday Sir Philip, who represented Britain at five Games, said: ‘These cuts are on top of the ones we have already made in the last 12 months and are likely to impact almost every stakeholder attending the Games.
The IPC said on Friday that 10 teams would still struggle to afford to come to the Games even when travel grants were paid.
Despite this, additional revenues are still short of the original budget planned for the Paralympics and the IPC has announced a raft of cuts, which include a downsizing of workforce, changes to the transport services offered to all clients, the closure of a number of venue media centres and a full review of the back-of-house spaces at all venues.
But Craven said the extra revenues “will not plug the Rio 2016 deficit”.
The wheelchair fencing is to be moved from the Deodoro complex to Rio’s main Olympic park.
Craven did admit that 10 nations were now unable to afford to travel to Rio but promised to find a way to get them there.
“Not only did we hold productive talks, but he picked up the phone on a number of occasions to get things moving, which gave us huge confidence”, Craven said of Temer.
The British Paralympic Association described the situation as “worrying”, while Paralympian Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson warned that the crisis risked making Paralympic athletes into “second class citizens”.
Craven also warned the crowds that flocked to stadiums in Beijing in 2008 or London four years later won’t rock up to Rio, with only 12 per cent of tickets sold. But smaller and poorer countries depend on funding from the IPC to send their teams to the games.
“We are working desperately hard to protect athlete services, especially within the field of play”.
“I am fully confident Rio 2016 will be the best Games ever in terms of athletic performance”, he said.
On the flip side, the athletes who can find a way to actually get to this year’s Paralympics will be comforted to know that the security now in place for Olympics will remain unaffected.
The International Paralympic Committee is relying on the Brazilian public purse to bail out the September Games, but a court injunction is preventing the government from handing over any money until the organisers open their books to public scrutiny.
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” London 2012 proudly showed the world what was possible and we want Rio to be the next stage of that positive journey”, the BPA added.
