The 14th General Assembly of National Olympic Committees opened on a positive note, with International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge reiterating assurances that Greece is more than capable of delivering high-calibre Olympic Games in August. Speaking to an audience of over 200 national Olympic representatives in Athens, Rogge maintained “in the most categorical way that the International Olympic Committee surrounds the Greek effort with absolute confidence.”
The words of Culture Minister Evangelos Venizelos , who has over-all supervision of the preparations, sounded equally optimistic, as he affirmed the nation’s readiness to meet the challenges of the ensuing Olympic countdown. “Most of the projects are 90% complete and within the next two months they will be delivered,” announced Venizelos.
Rogge specifically praised Athens’ commitment to Olympic safety , drawing attention to the extra security burden placed on organisers as a result of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States. "It is not an easy task to organize the Olympic Games," Rogge said. "Since September 11th the world has changed. We are now confronted with international terrorism."
Greece, one of the smallest countries to host the Olympics, saw safety costs skyrocket as a result of the 2001 terrorist strikes. A record 650 million euros is being spent on security for the Games, which is three times what Sydney spent for the 2000 Olympics.
Statements made by US officials regarding both security and infrastructure have echoed the Olympic organizing committee’s optimism. US State Department spokesman Richard Boucher recently declared that the US has “every confidence that Greece has the will and the resources to hold a secure and successful Olympics this year."
A work in progress
These reassurances are timely, for a recent barrage of negative press has threatened to dash faith in Athens’ ability to follow through with key projects. Rumoured to have started in Australia, the press onslaught has focused largely on plans to build a 130-million euro steel and glass roof over the main Olympic Stadium (OAKA) in Maroussi.
The hugely symbolic flagship venue is to host 9 out of 28 events, as well as the opening and closing ceremonies. But the tricky installation of the monumental canopy, designed by renowned Spanish architect Santiago Calatrava , has been a perpetual headache for technicians and construction specialists. Cited worries include the joining of the dome’s two arches and the reliability of foundational supports on the southeastern side of the arena .
Government and Olympic organising officials insist that the lumbering project will be ready in time, dismissing pessimistic press reports as hot air. Although minister Venizelos has acknowledged that Greece's preparations have faced "many hesitations, objections, rumours, ambiguous points, public controversies, and environmental and archaeological problems in different Olympic sites," his confidence regarding the completion of the main Olympic Stadium has been unbending. "There's no chance of the [canopy] not being there, because it already is there," Venizelos informed reporters after a February 17 cabinet meeting. "It is just being completed and moved into its final position."
In comments made to the BBC , the IOC’s top Athens overseer Denis Oswald has also conveyed his hope that the dome will be completed. Nonetheless, Oswald was also quick to note that the Games will be successful with or without the elaborate stadium canopy.
Time is tight for all remaining projects and in several cases organisers have finessed original plans for the sake of feasibility. Plans for another futuristic dome designed by Calatrava, which was to cover the Neratziotissa station and provide Olympic visitors with a monumental welcome, have been abandoned in favour of a more simple structure created by French experts. Located on the Attica Highway between the existing metro stations of Eirini and Maroussi, Neratziotissa will be a major transport hub providing access to key Olympic facilities.
As the main point of interchange between the highway and the city’s transport network, the station will constitute an additional stop on the metro , will provide a connection to the suburban railway travelling to and from Athens’ Eleftherios Venizelos Airport , and will be a major bus station.
Organisers are also in the process of rethinking ways to install a cover over the main swimming venue at the Maroussi Olympic complex in northern Athens . This shelter is deemed essential to provide protection against the scorching August sun and to meet TV coverage needs.
Despite hold-ups, Mustapha Larfaoui, the President of FINA (the international body governing swimming) informed journalists that he “is very optimistic that [the cover] will be ready on time” and that, overall, FINA is “very happy with the facilities and the organisation we have seen to date.”
The secret of success
Athens’ situation is hardly unique. Cutting back on the grandiose nature of original ideas and overcoming logistical obstacles have been features of Olympic preparations almost as old as the Games themselves. The Montreal 1976 Games were held with that city's Olympic Stadium dome incomplete . The run-up to the Atlanta 1996 Games was marred by transportation setbacks and Barcelona organisers operated under a vice-tight schedule.
Likewise, Sydney appeared to be in chaos in 1999: though most of the venues were finished, organisers were suffering from serious financial problems. It thus appears that part of the secret to holding successful Games involves not becoming preoccupied with the inevitable last-minute impediments and/ or criticism.
Determined not to let inflated rumours spiral into self-fulfilling prophecies, Athens 2004 (ATHOC) President Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki is keeping a clear head: “I concentrate on the work going on and not the comments. The question is not whether we are ready a year, or three months before. We have to be ready on the opening day.”
With less than six months until the opening ceremony, now is not the time to get bogged down in eleventh-hour controversies; it is time to shift efforts into high gear. After all, as Rogge frankly reminded Athens 2004’s doomsday prophesiers last August, "The proof of the pudding is in the eating and we will know by August 13, 2004 at 8pm when the opening ceremony starts."
