Baldwin’s Nomination Puts Onus on Diversity

U.S. Olympic Committee President Sandra Baldwin was formally nominated Wednesday for membership in the International Olympic Committee in a process that highlighted the geographic and gender issues confronting the IOC, which insists it is seeking a more diverse membership.

Baldwin, 62, was nominated to replace former USOC president Bill Hybl. She is widely expected to be confirmed as a member at IOC elections held in conjunction with the Salt Lake City Games in February.

“If elected, I will do my very best to represent the USOC,” she said.

Baldwin was the only one of 10 nominees announced Wednesday from the Western Hemisphere. The others include two Africans, three Asians and four Europeans, including the president of the Belgian National Olympic Committee, Francois Narmon. IOC President Jacques Rogge, elected to an eight-year term, is Belgian. The IOC membership has long been dominated by Europe.

Baldwin is the only woman on the list. She is the first female president in USOC history, elected last year to a four-year term.

She and Nadia Comaneci, the gymnast from Romania who won three gold medals at the 1976 Montreal Games, were the only women on the original list of 82 nominees submitted to the IOC by national Olympic committees and sports federations. Comaneci did not make the cut.

“We had two women,” Rogge said. “I regret that.”

Women made up about 40% of the competitors at the 2000 Sydney Summer Games. But of the IOC’s 123 members, only 12 are female. That list will dwindle to 11 at the turn of the year when Flor Isava-Fonseca of Venezuela retires. Anita DeFrantz of Los Angeles, a member since 1986, is second on the IOC’s seniority list of female members, behind only Princess Nora of Lichtenstein.

Baldwin’s election would push the number back to 12.

Comaneci was proposed as a member representing the Romanian Olympic committee, Rogge said. But she lives in the U.S.--in Norman, Okla., with her husband, Bart Connor, a former U.S. gymnast--and that disqualified her, he said.

The IOC’s approach on this issue can be hard to figure out.

Traditionally, a number of African members maintained residences in Europe. Even now, some members keep summer homes or work-related apartments in Europe--such as Israel’s Alex Gilady, officially based in Tel Aviv.

Johann Olav Koss, the Norwegian speedskating star who became an IOC member in 1999, is based in Canada. He remains a member because he was elected as an athlete’s representative, not on behalf of the Norwegian Olympic committee.