Prospects for a Budapest Olympics

Budapest has the necessary qualities to win the right to host the Olympics, but the city - and the country - could not hold the Games in the condition they are in today, according to a study by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC). We spoke to the president of the Budapest Olympic Movement (BOM) and a sport economist.

© BOM

But most experts hvg.hu spoke to thought it unlikely that the example set by China would be followed. If the International Olympic Committee (IOC) allowed the trend to continue, then it would be shooting itself in the foot, according to Attila Szalay-Berzeviczy, head of the Budapest Olympic Movement. It would dramatically reduce the number of cities capable of hosting the games, and it would mean the games was no longer about the people playing, he said. Ferenc Denes said it was still possible to host a good games without spending on a Chinese scale. He gave the example of the 2000 Sydney games, which was praised as a human-scale Olympics.

He said budgeting for the expenditure would be a problem for a small country, but that infrastructure would not need to be a problem. The challenge for Hungary would be convincing citizens that their country was in a position to host the games, he said. The sport economist added that the current economic situation made it unlikely that the games could be held in Budapest.

But Szalay-Berzeviczy disagreed: a project on this scale would, he said, help promote political unity and budgetary discipline, as well as speeding the country's and the city's infrastructural development.

The 2020 Games are the earliest the Budapest could bid for. The time for this comes in 2011. At the moment, the country has to decide whether it is worth starting the preparatory work, according to the president of the BOM.

This stage of the preparations would not be about the buildings and the investments but about the financial planning, choosing locations and working on international sport diplomacy, Attila Szalay-Berzeviczy said.

Aside from this, the government has to work on the convergence programme, on getting the economy moving and on introducing the euro so that, in 2011, when Hungary holds the EU presidency, the threads could come to together, he added.

PwC's 2006 feasibility study warned of the risk of destabilising the budget, but BOM's president does not see this as an impossible challenge. Preparing for the Olympics would create budgetary problems if the financial planning was inadequate, he said. He thought it would be possible to learn from the mistakes made in previous Olympics.

The population would certainly have to bear some of the burden. But Szalay-Berzeviczy believed people would be prepared to offer their support if the project was carried out transparently. So he did not expect a lack of support.

In connection with the current gloomy economic conditions, he pointed out that winning the right to host the Games and holding them were part of a 20-year process. It would be pointless, he added, to form an opinion based on the current economic environment. It was worth taking current trends as a basis for long-term projects, he said. At the same time, he added, "Hungary needs something big."

Zs.Sz.