Kasparov discloses contracts with federation official
Dylan Loeb Mccain
Monday, 27 January 2014 15:45
NDTV Sports
Gary Kasparov is running for president of the World Chess Federation. He has sought to highlight transparency by revealing agreements previously made with an official who is now part of his list of candidates to lead the organisation.
Garry Kasparov, a former chess world champion who is running for president of the World Chess Federation, released previously confidential agreements Friday involving himself and one of the officials who is part of his slate of candidates to lead the organization.
An earlier draft contract, revealed in an article in The New York Times this week, indicated that the official, Ignatius Leong – the general secretary of the federation under its longtime president, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, who is running for re-election – was paid to join Kasparov’s campaign. The draft also stated that Leong, a powerful figure in chess in Asia, was being paid to supply votes for Kasparov’s election. The election will be in August in Tromso, Norway, as part of the biennial Chess Olympiad.
The final agreements were released on Kasparov’s election website. A statement accompanying the disclosure said that “the Kasparov Team welcomes such transparency and are looking forward to seeing our opponents act in the same manner.”
One of the contracts is an update of the previous draft. The draft said that Kasparov would pay Leong $500,000. That is not part of the revised agreement.
But the final agreement, as in the earlier draft, promises to pay Asean Chess Academy, an organization for teaching children that was founded and is owned by Leong, $250,000 annually for four years, beginning in 2013. The payments will come through a newly created foundation. As in the draft, the agreement can be voided and the final $500,000 not paid if Kasparov is not elected.
According to the final agreement, Leong is “responsible for delivering a minimum of 10 1 vote from his region, with the effort to deliver 15 votes (not counting China).” In language that appears stronger in the final version than in the draft, the agreement goes on to say, “Support from each of these above mentioned federations must materialize in the form of a written and signed statement and/or an irrevocable proxy, before the last tranche of payment takes place.”
Source: http://sports.ndtv.com
Kasparov is the most honest politician. He deserves to be President of Russia instead of Putin. Maybe he can run against Hillary Clinton in the next election.
http://www.chessvibes.com/leaked-contract-between-kasparov-and-leong-transparency-vs-ethics
Dylan Loeb McClain posted this on Chessvibes when being confronted by a supporter of Kasparov:
I suspect that you are not impartial in this matter, but I will reply nonetheless so that others who be reading this thread might have my viewpoint.
First, I and The Times were not hoodwinked by FIDE or a FIDE official. I actually could not believe that a contract like this existed when I received it. It was only after Morten Sand, the lawyer hired by Kasparov, who drew up the contract, confirmed its authenticity that we went ahead with the article.
Second, both the original draft contract and the final version say that money is being paid for chess education and development, but half of it is contingent on the results of the election. In other words, the political result of the election is the key to the contributions, not education.
Third, the contract, both in its draft form and its final form explicitly state how many votes Mr. Leong is to provide in return for the financing. Does that sound like contributions for educational purposes? I’ll let others decide.
Fourth, the director of the new Kasparov Chess Foundation Asia Pacific, that is supposed to oversee the distribution of the money for educational purposes — perhaps even to Mr. Leong’s Asean Chess Academy, which is a for-profit entity — is non other than Mr. Leong.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I am interested in and will report on any topic that I and the editors of The Times believe is relevant and important. I and they have absolutely no biases or predispositions about what we report or what the results of an election should be….
In the case of the contract between Mr. Kasparov and Mr. Leong, it was a document and it was authenticated. That is why I was and did report on it. As I cannot do these sort of things without approval from higher up editors at The Times, you should realize that they agreed with me about the importance and newsworthiness of the contract.
Why not China? I can deliver China, but it will cost you gold.