Olympic boxing gender controversy: IOC leaving questions unanswered has created a wildfire of speculation

PARIS — The question of whether boxers Imane Khelif of Algeria and Lin Yu-ting of Chinese Taipei should be allowed to compete at the Olympics is not nearly as cut and dried as many critics are howling.

It also isn't as cut and dried as the International Olympic Committee is saying in defense.

What is undeniably known is that there is still so much unknown. The blame for that falls on the IOC, which wandered into this controversy seemingly blind to the facts and as such got caught flat-footed as a global controversy erupted.

One of two things is possibly happening here.

Either the women’s boxing competition features two fighters with an unfair advantage — or at least were previously disqualified from competition by the International Boxing Association for what it saw as an unfair advantage — or two innocent two fighters are being unfairly attacked and under extreme harassment.

There will be no solution here that satisfies everyone, especially when the topic is such a political winner for various factions on all sides of the argument around the world.

Still, the IOC should have seen all of this coming and been prepared with more information than they admit they have.

The IOC has the most reach and most resources to find out the full story here and then relaying it to the public. It is also the organization responsible for a final ruling — whatever that may be.

Yet because of a feud with the IBA, the IOC admits it doesn’t even know what, how or why the IBA ever tested the two fighters, let alone why they “failed” two unspecified gender eligibility tests, at both the 2022 and 2023 World Championships.

So everyone is wandering around with half the story and the IOC is angry the wildfire of speculation is overshadowing the Games.

Let's start with this though, which IOC spokesman Mark Adams is adamant. Khelif, who overpowered Italy's Angela Carini in just 46 seconds on Thursday to spark this wildfire, is not a transgender athlete, which brings separate intensity to the situation.

“The Algerian boxer was born female, was registered female, lived her life as a female, boxed as a female and has a female passport,” Adams said. “This is not a transgender case. There has been some confusion that this is a man fighting a woman. This is just not the case. On that there is consensus. Scientifically this is not a man fighting a woman.”

What’s left is where everything gets confusing, often in ways that you wouldn’t think would be confusing. Is this about testosterone? Is it about chromosomes? Is it about something else?

The central issue is that the IBA disqualified the boxers during the 2023 World Championships in New Delhi, India, because they “failed to meet eligibility rules.” Khelif, of Algeria, was barred from competing in the finals just hours before the bout.

A review of the minutes from the IBA decision read as such:

“IBA Secretary General and CEO explained that testing was conducted upon the request of the Technical Delegate and Medical Jury of the Championships. The results became available in seven days … [the IBA] notified the athletes immediately about their disqualification ...

“Mr. [George A.] Yerolimpos confirmed that similar testing was conducted by a different independent laboratory with the same athletes at the previous edition of the IBA Women’s World Boxing Championships in Istanbul, Turkey in 2022. However, the results were received only upon conclusion of the event, hence the athletes were not disqualified back then.”

The IBA’s minutes say that it could not test the athletes prior to their arrival in India for the 2023 World Championships because they were “outside IBA control.”

So that’s two “tests” over two years.

The IOC website originally stated that the boxers were disqualified for "elevated testosterone" although that has since been taken out of their online Olympic bios. However, IBA president Umar Kremlev told the Russian news agency Tass last year that the disqualifications were because "it was proven they have XY chromosomes."

From the IBA minutes: “Mr. Yerolimpos confirmed that IBA has the results from two independent laboratories in two different countries at its disposal, both of which indicate that the athletes do not meet one of the eligibility criteria to continue competing at the Championships.”

The IOC, however, stripped the IBA of its status as the global governing body for boxing years ago due to governance issues and judging scandals. As such, the IBA isn’t in charge of the Olympic boxing competition. That job has fallen on the IOC, which, perhaps clouded by its feud with the IBA, is skeptical of the administration.

As such, the IOC is not honoring the IBA’s decisions. It is citing uneven procedures and uncertainties over what the tests actually were. Adams continually repeated himself Friday morning in Paris at a news conference.

“We don't know what the protocol was, we don't know that the test was accurate, we don’t know if we should believe the test,” he said.

“A test that may have happened overnight, a made up test, that was new, I don't think we should give that any credence at all,” he added later.

“As for the tests themselves, we have no knowledge of what the tests were,” he mentioned a third time. “They were cobbled together as I understand it, to change the results.”

Well, go find out what they were.

Let’s say the IBA’s process was completely dishonest and corrupt and should be denounced. If so, find that out and make the argument for that, because, if that's the case, then by just shrugging its collective shoulders the IOC is doing massive and unfair damage to Imane Khelif and Lin Yu-ting.

Leaving questions unanswered has created a vacuum of suspicion.

Adams seemed more upset with the IBA seemingly rewriting its rules in the middle of the 2023 World Championships.

“Clearly, and I think everyone would agree, you don’t change the rules during competition; no one should change the rules during competition,” Adams said. “Everyone should have certainty during competition.”

Ideally, but what if, hypothetically, the IBA found that any opponent of the two boxers was at an unfair — and considering this is boxing, unsafe — disadvantage. Wouldn’t it be proper to immediately step in then?

“[Khelif] has competed for many, many years in this sport against many opponents, including Italian boxers the last couple of years,” Adams noted, which is important.

They are both women’s boxing veterans, including at the Olympics, and do not win all of their matches. Khelif has fought other Italian opponents in the past. So why is this suddenly an issue?

Mainly because the IOC’s dismissal — or at least lack of curiosity — of whatever the IBA found. Rather than get the full facts from the IBA so that they do know the protocols, types of tests and reasons behind it — and thus either honor it or publicly explain why they should not be honored — they are using their lack of knowledge as a crutch in their decision that this isn’t a big deal.

Maybe the two boxers should fight; USA Boxing, for example, said it has no concerns and “has confidence” in the IOC eligibility process. Maybe they shouldn’t.

Someone, however, ought to know the whole story before making that determination.

That’s the job of the IOC. And it has failed miserably at it.