Monaco, June 10, 2016 – The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) today suspended three members of staff for breaching code of ethics of the federation.
Those suspended are Nick Davies, Jane Boulter-Davies and (3) Pierre-Yves Garnier.
They were suspended for a period of 180 days, starting Friday 10 June 2016, pending investigation of the potential breaches of the IAAF’s Code of Ethics, the IAAF said in a statement. Chairman of the IAAF Ethics Board, Michael Beloff said the decision was taken after consultation with the other members of the Ethics Board.
He said the suspension has been imposed in the interests of the integrity of the sport but warned against
prejudging outcome of the investigations which are now to follow. Here are graphic details of the offence committed by the three involved.
“Sensing that danger was near, Papa Massata Diack sent, on 29 July 2013, an email to his father, entitled ‘Strictly Confidential’. He wrote that Valentin Balakhnichev had asked him “to become internally involved with the IAAF staff who had been antagonistic towards him in the process handling this file since September 2012 and to this end, lobbying activities were carried out and efforts at providing explanations were made with C. Thiaré (50 K), Nick Davies (UK press lobbying 30 K, and to assuage Jane Boulter), G. Dollé (50 K) et PY Garnier(Champagnole assistance 10 K, managed by Cheikh).” “K means kilo and the currency is in dollars or in euros”, Lamine Diack explained eruditely at his fourth hearing.
And for deciphering: “Papa Massata Diack gave money to various people to keep them quiet and so
that they would not object.”
The prima facie cases are, in summary, as follows:
1. As against Mr Davies, (a) that Mr Davies received an undisclosed cash payment in 2013 from Mr Papa Massata Diack, then a consultant to the IAAF, the circumstances and concealment of which call into question whether the payment was intended to have and/or in fact produced any manipulative effect; and (b) that Mr Davies misled an IAAF Ethics Board investigator in respect of the matter identified in (a) above.
2. As against Ms Boulter-Davies (a) that Ms Boulter-Davies received or had knowledge of receipt by Mr Nick Davies of an undisclosed cash payment in 2013 made by Mr Papa Massata Diack, then a consultant to the IAAF, the circumstances and concealment of which raise the question whether the payment was intended to have and/or in fact produced any manipulative effect; and (b) that Ms Boulter-Davies misled an IAAF Ethics Board investigator in respect of the matter identified in (a). As against Mr Garnier, (a) that Mr Garnier received an undisclosed cash payment in 2013 at the direction of the IAAF’s former President Lamine Diack, the circumstances and non-disclosure of which raise the question whether the payment was intended to have and/or in fact produced any manipulative effect; and (b) retained some part of the sum even when aware of its apparent impropriety.
Responding to the decision of the board, the IAAF said there is no greater priority for the IAAF right now than to get to the truth of the allegations that have been made against the sport.
“These particular facts were made public in December 2015 and relate to allegations of a breach of the IAAF Code of Ethics.The IAAF welcomes these investigations by the Ethics Board and investigator Sir Anthony Hooper and thanks them for the difficult and hard work they continue to undertake on behalf of the sport and the organisation”.
