Roy Jones Jr. leads protests over exclusion of boxing from Olympics
Former Unified Light Heavyweight Champion and boxing legend Roy Jones Jr. led a group of protesters outside the Olympic house in Lausanne, Switzerland, to stand against boxing being excluded from the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games.
Roy Jones Jr. has been an avid supporter of the sport being reinstated into the Olympics since the IBA's ban earlier this year. He told PTI in an email interview:
"I was robbed of a gold medal but the Olympics was my first ever real goal in my young life. If I do not stand for boxing after all it has given me, then why even have been given the gift from God."
Protestors carried signs and wore t-shirts that read “No boxing without IBA" and "No Olympics without Boxing" in a unified effort to undo the decision to exclude boxing from the initial list of sports at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles in 2028.
Initially, a group of 40 athletes and coaches gathered from a plethora of nations, such as Switzerland, France and Poland, and the crowd later grew to 80 or so people. The protestors were then joined by Roy Jones Jr., who arrived in a vehicle donning the same slogans as the supporters and entered the Olympic House to discuss the future of boxing at the Games with International Olympic Committee officials (IOC).
What made Roy Jones Jr. and his supporters protest?
The IBA, formerly known as AIBA, was stripped of its IOC recognition in June 2019. The IOC is concerned about the IBA’s "financial dependency" on Russian state-owned Gazprom and the "increased" role of the Presidential office in Moscow. In a statement about the protest, the IBA said:
"IBA acknowledges and gives its appreciation to the boxers and coaches from six countries who took part in a peaceful demonstration in front of the IOC Headquarters in Lausanne [and also commend Jones Jr. and the participants for their] brave actions of support [for] athletes, the sport of boxing, and our organization."
IOC spokesperson Mark Adams said that the organization spoke with the protestors to allow them to raise their concerns.
“There was a demonstration outside by supporters of IBA, and we heard their concerns, we had a team went down and I believe they were even invited into the offices and we had a discussion, a very constructive discussion. We heard what they had to say."
Roy Jones Jr. told InsideTheGames that he is "more confident" of boxing’s prospects after his discussions with the IOC.