Salt Lake’s Welch Answers Charges

Insisting he bribed no one and did nothing wrong, Tom Welch, the former president of the Salt Lake Organizing Committee, contended his organization acted responsibly in its winning bid for the 2002 Winter Olympics.

Welch is accused of bribing IOC officials in the biggest corruption scandal in Olympic history.

The Deseret News reported Sunday that Welch acknowledged cash payments and gifts to IOC members, but called them contributions.

“We never bribed anybody. We never bought a vote,” Welch said. “We made contributions out there as a part of the Olympic family, as an obligation we have. . . . It was the responsible thing to do.”

Welch acknowledged giving $50,000 in cash to Jean-Claude Ganga, an IOC member from the Republic of Congo. Ganga sought the money to help children in the African nation ravaged by civil strife, Welch said. “That’s where I think the money went.”

He also acknowledged the bid committee made a $10,000 contribution to the campaign of Chilean IOC member Sergio Santander Fantini, who was running for mayor of Santiago.

Welch, who resigned from the Salt Lake Organizing Committee in 1997 after being charged with spousal abuse, said he will challenge the right of the committee to cancel his $10,000-per-month consulting contract. The committee also stripped him of his $500,000 pension.

The Zurich weekly newspaper SonntagsZeitung reported that the IOC intends to begin questioning some members of the Salt Lake committee. “We have now identified all those members from whom we want an explanation,” said Dick Pound, IOC vice president. “We will send them letters in which they will be invited to answer a few questions for us.”

Pound declined to identify the IOC members concerned or to say how many letters will be sent.

“I can’t say that yet because first we want to give all the suspects the chance to explain,” he said.

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American oil company Texaco-Caltex has pulled out of a $6.3-million Olympic sponsorship deal with the Sydney Organizing Committee, leaving the 2000 Summer Games organizers with a possible revenue shortfall.

Texaco-Caltex pulled out after 12 months of negotiations, saying it had already signed up as a major sponsor of the U.S. Olympic team and as a major partner for the Salt Lake Winter Games.