Olympics: Flame row brings 'reptile' taunt

By GREG ANSLEY

CANBERRA - Kevan Gosper, the one-time silver medallist racing neck-and-neck to replace Juan Antonio Samaranch as president of the International Olympic Committee, has become this week's most-loathed Australian.

The Sydney Daily Telegraph headlined his surname as an acronym: GOSPER: Greedy, Obstinate, Selfish, Pompous, Egotistic, Reptile.

The rival Sydney Morning Herald was more demure, but still sharp: Blowtorch on Gosper.

Around the world, Gosper, whose bid to beat Canadian Dick Pound, Belgian Jacques Rogge and Korean Un Yong Kim to the world's top sports job hangs by a thread, has been exposed to similar taunts.

The BBC, CNN and the New York Times are among the heavy-hitters to put the heat on Gosper, while British journalist Andrew Jennings, whose book Lord of the Rings exposed corruption in the IOC, appeared on national morning television in Australia to accuse him of uncouth nepotism.

Gosper is a life member of the Australian Olympic Committee, vice-president of the Sydney Games organising committee, and a vice-president of the IOC.

His sin was to allow - if not arrange or encourage - his 11-year-old daughter, Sophie, to take the Olympic flame from Greek high jumper Lambros Papacostas to become the second runner and first Australian to take the torch on its journey south.

This was suspect enough in the eyes of critics who have long bridled at what they term Gosper's arrogance, and who delighted in the smear cast on his reputation by allegations earlier this year that he had accepted favours during Salt Lake City's bid for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

Far worse was the fact that a 16-year-old second-generation Greek-Australian, Yianna Souleles, was supposed to have been the first Australian to carry the torch in symbolism of the ties between the two countries.

Yianna arrived in Athens to discover at the last moment that she had been pushed down the list by the Hellenic Olympic Committee's invitation to Gosper to hand the honour instead to Sophie.

Her response has been gracious.

She said: "Sophie did what she had to do and I did what I had to do. She is really nice."

But Australia has been outraged, blasting Gosper from news headlines, on talkback radio, in the offices of political leaders, in the Senate, and from a pethora of other Establisment and sporting pillars.

Ron Clarke, the world distance champion of the 1960s and the man who lit the flame at the 1956 Olympics, attacked Gosper's decision to allow Sophie to displace Yianna and warned it would damage his IOC presidency hopes.

"As a father and as an IOC delegate he could have stopped it and he didn't," Clarke said on Sydney Radio 2UE.

Federal Opposition Leader Kim Beazley said Gosper's decision was a mistake, and Labour Senator Chris Schacht intends asking the Senate to formally protest and express deep regret at Yianna's dumping.

But despite the barrage, Gosper has been unfazed and admits no wrong.

"Somehow in my heart I felt it was intended to be," he said.

"You know, I am an Olympian and to see Soph carry the torch was quite something."