Hamburg: Germany’s sports stars have pledged their support to Hamburg’s bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games, which faces a referendum today that has split the Hanseatic city.
Hamburg would need to see off rivals Budapest, Paris, Los Angeles and Rome to host the Games when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announce their decision on September 13, 2017.
But first the German bid must receive the backing of residents in Hamburg and neighbouring Kiel, where the sailing events would take place.
According to a survey commissioned by the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DSOB) this month, only 56 percent of Hamburg residents wanted their port city to host the Games -- down from 63 percent in September.
A final decision is expected at 2200 local time (2100 GMT) tonight.
In order for the Hamburg bid to continue, a majority yes-vote is required -- as well as the support of at least 260,000 people, or 20 percent of the city-state’s population. Nearly 500,000 have already sent in absentee votes.
Both Mario Goetze, who scored Germany’s winning goal in the 2014 World Cup final, and Joachim Loew, who coached the team to their Brazil triumph, have backed the bid.
Former tennis star Michael Stich, NBA superstar Dirk Nowitzki and former ice-skating world and Olympic champion Katarina Witt have also pledged support.
“We want all those identified with the Hamburg bid to be perceived internationally as the faces of German sport,” said DSOB president Alfons Hoermann.
Critics are concerned by the staggering costs of hosting the Games -- projected at 11.2bn euros ($11.9bn) -- and question the sustainability of the project.
A counter campaign -- NOlympics Hamburg -- has labelled the Summer Games “a money-burning machine”, which “speeds up gentrification” and is “not sustainable”. It has gained support amongst local residents.
“The Olympia threatens to become a costly nightmare for Hamburg”, NOlympia activist Michael Rothschuh told SID. “Hamburg does not need the Olympics.”
Stich says it’s now or never and echoed Hoermann’s sentiments that a ‘No’ decision will make it more difficult to get financial support for less visible sporting disciplines in football-mad Germany.
“If it turns out to be a negative answer, I don’t think Germany will apply in my lifetime again for an Olympic Games. It would be a very bad sign, for the whole country,” the 47-year-old Stich told SID.
Meanwhile, Brazil is preparing to deal with a terrorist attack at the Rio Olympics but has no information of any planned plots, the country’s intelligence chief said yesterday.
“We have no information about a terrorist cell preparing in Brazil. Our risk assessment does not indicate this, but we are working permanently as if the threat were imminent, as if this could happen tomorrow,” Wilson Trezza, director of the Brazilian Intelligence Agency, said.
With nine months before the first Summer Games in South America, Brazilian security officials say they will be able to stop any threat. Brazil has no history of conflict with Islamist or other violent radical groups. However, with 10,500 athletes from 206 countries and dozens of heads of state and large numbers of tourists, the Olympics are considered a potential target. Brazil says it will deploy 85,000 security personnel, double the number used during the 2012 London Olympics.
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