posted July 8, 2005 at 16:52 in Other Articles

Happy Faces in the London Crowd

London, England won the right to host the 2012 Olympic Games by beating out arch-rival Paris, France in one of the most highly contested voting races in recent history.

London won 54-50 on the fourth ballot of the IOC vote to beat out Paris, while New York, Madrid and Moscow were eliminated in the first three rounds.

Although Paris had been the early favourite throughout the public relations’ campaigns for each bidding city, London’s bid got late support from international soccer star David Beckham as well as Prime Minister Tony Blair. These late momentum-changers may have made the difference in the final voting.

Blair was in Scotland, hosting the G-8 summit when he heard the result, and had spent two days in Singapore this week doing lobbying for London’s bid.

“Many people do reckon that London is the greatest city in the whole world at the moment,” said Blair. “This is a momentous day for London.”

London’s victorious bid and the results of the final balloting were announced by IOC President Jacques Rogge. London will be hosting the Games for the first time since 1948, while Paris lost their bid for the third time in the last 20 years, following failed bids for the 1992 and 2008 Olympic Games.

The fact that Paris had lost two previous bids was perceived as an advantage because the IOC usually rewards persistence. But the cards didn’t fall for the Frenchmen.

“I’ll put all my energy into our recovery, so that we know how to make something big and positive out of this ordeal,” said Paris Mayor Bertrand Delanoe.

Paris never led through out the voting. After the first round London had 22 votes to Paris’ 21, Madrid’s 20 and New York’s 19. In the second round Madrid led with 32 votes to London’s 27 and Paris’ 25. The third round saw London lead 39 – 33 over Paris and the fourth round ended the action.

London’s winning bid followed three previous losing efforts from England after Birmingham lost out in 1992 and Manchester failed in 1996 and 2000.

Although Blair and Beckham may have tilted the voter’s balance, credit has to be given to Sebastian Coe, who took over as the head of London’s bidding team in May of 2004 from American business woman Barbara Cassani.