The DOSB is increasingly criticized in view of its lover course in the Olympic advertising. The sports show has heard itself – and has met in many places.
The viscous way with which Germany is looking for its applicant for the Summer Olympics 2036, 2040 or 2044 is increasingly also criticizing the applicants themselves. The German Olympic Sportbund (DOSB) has changed its procedure several times and important details are still open.
“I am very unhappy about it, I can honestly say that, because I hoped that you learned from the 2012 application “said CDU politician Jens Lehmann of the Sportschau. “There have been five cities in competition, now it is similar.”
Lehmann is a two-time cycling Olympic champion, won gold in the team tracking in 1992 and 2000. Today he is sitting in the Bundestag and is the deputy chairman of the sports committee there.
The fiasco with Leipzig
Said 2012 application had found an inglorious end in 2003. At that time, Düsseldorf, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Leipzig and Stuttgart for Germany wanted to go into the race for the summer games in 2012. At the end of a costly proceedings, the members of the National Olympic Committee (NOK) Leipzig chose the winner, although other applications were better assessed.
The bankruptcy on the international parquet was foreseeable: the International Olympic Committee (IOC) criticized missing infrastructure, Leipzig already strain in the pre -selection and awarded the games to London. The application for fiasco became Germany and caused a violent argument in local sport.
As a successor to the NOK, the German Olympic Sports Association (DOSB) wanted to do everything better in the current advance. He wanted to agree on an application with the interested parties in order to no longer produce losers and to have nationwide support. But that has long been history.
Command back in the DOSB strategy
Instead, the current status is that the four interested parties Berlin, Hamburg, Munich and North Rhine-Westphalia (Rhein-Ruhr) have to vote in order to exist at an extraordinary DOSB general meeting in September 2026 at a fight vote. So there is a whole year for self -promotion and taunts.
“I can only hope that there will be fairness that the other three inferior cities also support the German application. But I have my doubts”, said CDU politician Lehmann. “I would have liked to have decided earlier because it would have saved a lot, lots of money and many, many emotions.”
Criticism from Hamburg and Berlin
There is also a lack of mood in the applicant cities. “That is what we actually wanted to avoid: a long -running competition between four regions”, said the Hamburg interior senator Andy Grote of the sports show. “Of course there is a desire not to produce any winners and losers, a pious wish. Of course there will be somehow.”
Berlin’s Olympic ambassador Kaweh Niroomand also preferred the original plan to choose a city from the start. “Then march international with the federal government under the arm – we may have had better chances and this inner German competition would be avoided.”
Question mark in Munich
As early as 2021, DOSB President Thomas Weikert said in a sports show interview that he wanted to get a German application for the summer games 2036 during his tenure. However, even the applicants are still open to the applicants for four years and several changed schedule later.
“I actually don’t know how to choose”, said Munich Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD). “I also don’t know if there is a point system or whether the hand is lifted. I am a convinced democrat and hope that things are going democratically.”
Citizens’ decision Already at the end of October
Despite the ambiguities, Munich is pushing ahead and has already voted at the end of October whether the city should continue its application. “You have to ask the question of why the citizens’ decision actually takes place so early. The DOSB does not know exactly how the application process will continue and the citizens are now deciding. “
That said Ludwig Hartmann (Bündnis 90/Die Grünen) of the Sportschau. He is Vice President of the Bavarian state parliament and was part of the “Nolympia” movement, which had contributed to the failure of the Munich application for the Winter Games 2022 in 2013. Hartmann also said he thinks it “It is astonishing that the PRO side invests 1.8 million euros in a campaign with taxpayers – only in Munich. Why do we actually afford an application circus within Germany from tax money, where you don’t even know what you want?”
Six million euros for the Citizens’ decision in Munich
There is currently little clarity with the costs. Munich estimates a good six million euros for the citizens’ decision and the accompanying Pro campaign. The other costs for 2026 are not yet calculated, also because information from the DOSB would be.
Rhein-Ruhr and Berlin stated that they had not yet budgeted at the Sportschau request that they had not yet budgeted.
View in the NRW budget draft
In the meantime, the budget draft for 2026 by the Prime Minister of North Rhine -Westphalia under the point “Sportstättenbau” there is an increase of around 27 million euros compared to the previous year. This increase is justified, among other things, with “measures in connection with a application for the application for the direction of the organization of Olympic and Paralympic Games in North Rhine-Westphalia”.
When asked about this in the Sportschau interview, the country’s Prime Minister, Hendrik Wüst (CDU), said that only the very smallest part was used for Olympic acquisition. Most of them are intended for the continuation of the sports facility promotion.
NRW Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst in an interview
The most expensive application in history?
On the other hand, it shows how expensive the Olympic rooms can be. For the current and coming year, the Senate calculates expenses with almost 18 million euros.
If the other applicants end up with similar sums, it is foreseeable that this Olympic race will be the most expensive in German history. The DOSB had always advertised that Olympic acquisitions were significantly cheaper since the IOC changed the award procedure.
Change of leadership At the DOSB
The DOSB with its Olympic acquisition unit seems overwhelmed. An example: Finally, he said goodbye to the plan to make a pre -selection and then only present the 2026 general meeting. However, he did not communicate this change publicly and also denied a change of strategy when asked. In doing so, it is severely extended and tightened by the elimination competition that there should now be a combat vote.
In the middle of the hot phase, there were also change in the highest main office, the chairmanship of the board. At the end of 2024 Torsten Burmester had to go under inglorious conditions, Volker Bouffier (CDU) came in the interim. Otto Fricke has now taken over on September 1st.
Fricke: “There will always be changes”
The ungrateful task is now to defend the lover course and lead to the finish line. Why now a fight vote, similar to 2003? “If you had done this without it, some would have said again: yes, have a look, a few officials decide.”
Fricke also emphasizes that the general assembly in 2025 will decide on the further procedure and that there will always be changes in the face of new requirements and developments. At least on this point seems to be relating to Germany’s Olympic efforts.