On Friday, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) granted the Chinese city the right to hold the Games after a secret vote in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It was a sad competition this time around, with only two candidates seeing through the application to be a host — Beijing, China and Almaty, Kazakhstan.
Numerous cities dropped out of the bidding process. Oslo in Norway, Stockholm in Sweden, Krakow in Poland and Lviv in Ukraine all put in initial bids to the IOC, which were later retracted. The cities dropped out due to varying degrees of lack of financial, public and government support, while Ukraine dropped its bid due to the unrest in the country.
The Swedish capital pulled out in December 2012 after politicians declined to give financial support. The Polish city withdrew in May 2014 after 70% of residents rejected the bid in a referendum. While in October of the same year, Oslo finally dropped out of the race after failing to gain government financial support for the bid.
All these decisions seem like very logical reasons after the farce that was the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. The country spent a massive $51 billion to host the games, which was marred with gay rights issues, preparation concerns, corruption allegations and the country's ongoing conflict with Ukraine. It also saw the infrastructure created for the winter extravaganza left vacant and had little positive impact on the people of Russia.
On Friday, the IOC was faced with two starkly different choices that were both considered long shots when the bid race opened two years ago: Beijing, which hosted the 2008 Olympics, offers the experience and some venues from the former Olympics, but lacks natural snow or winter conditions, while lesser-known Almaty boasts a mountain setting with plenty of natural snow.
Each city gave 45 minute final presentations to the IOC, with 15 minutes allotted for questions and answers. The Almaty delegation was led by Kazakhstan Prime Minister Karim Massimov. Beijing's team was headed by Chinese Vice Premier Liu Yandong.
Almaty, who presented first, sees the Olympics as a way to help raise Kazakhstan's profile on the international stage. The prime minister of Kazakhstan challenged the IOC on Friday to make a "historic decision" by awarding the 2022 Winter Olympics to the city, painting the project as the one that offers real snow and mountain conditions as opposed to the rival bid from Beijing.
The Chinese team countered that it offers experience, reliability and the prospect of bringing winter sports to a market of 300 million people in northern China. The country's win sees it become the first city to stage both summer and winter Olympic Games.
Fuente: mashable.com
