We're Already Ready!

78th FIDE Congress Took Place in Kemer

 

On the second day of the Executive Board Meeting of 78th FIDE Congress. there were important bidding votes for Turkey. Turkey is going to organize 2009 World Youth Chess Championship and 2009 World Team Championship. After the meetings there was a dinner and several presentations during the dinner including 2008 Olympiad in Dresden which is going to be announced today officially on the final day of the congress and Vietnam 2008, World Youth Chess Championship. The main presentation of the night was "Universal Chess Portal" which is the project of TCF President and newly elected FIDE Vice President Ali Nihat Yazıcı and TCF's web designing and providing partner Palaswork explaining the TCF web portal in Turkey, extending it universally altogether for world chess and explained how to create news easily on the portal also used for TCF web site. In the dinner, the a picture of the 2009 World Youth Championship was ready with the slogan: "We're already ready!"

All the details of the voting procedure and the other significant items on the chess agenda are reported by TCF Press Officer Özgür Akman at the link below together with a photo gallery with many pictures.

Picture Gallery         FIDE Press Release

 

On the second day of the 78th FIDE Congress, the first major issue in the morning agenda was the world championship system and upcoming match between newly crowned world champion Vishy Anand and Vladimir Kramnik.  FIDE Vice President and Chariman of the Congress Georgios Makropoulos explained that Topalov and Kramnik's "so-called privileges" were actually their legal rights which could altogether be traced back to 2005 San Luis. Also, some minor details about the upcoming Anand-Kramnik match and the new world championship system which is a combination of Grand Prix and World Cup was explained.

 

Berik Balgabaev, the assistant of FIDE President while CEO of Global Chess and former Vice President of FIDE Geoffrey Borg who stepped down from his position in FIDE. On the right side, GM Yuri Razuvaev with President of ISCU (International Schools Chess Union) Alexander Kostev and Viron Tsorbatzoglu

When GM Yuri Razuvaev, the head of FIDE Trainers' Committee delivered his speech he spoke highly about the Turkish trainers that attended the Chess Academy in Berlin and these trainers' FIDE Trainer norms were approved during the meeting. Apart from that, Tournament Director of TCF Abdurrahman Koral was awarded with International Organizer title. It was also decided that the World School's Chess Championship winners are going to be awarded with "Candidate Master" title which means that Atilla Köksal Yüksel and Cemil Can Ali Marandi are going to be awarded with Candidate Master title. Another interesting topic was women's chess. It was agreed in principle that there is going to be more  women's elite tournaments in the future. Linares, the most prominent chess torunaments is also going to have a women's event. Furthermore, Grand Prix system would be also modified for women.

 

Deputy President Georgios Makropoulos in his usual charmful way while new Vice President Ali Nihat Yazıcı talks with FIDE Director Davit Jareet while FIDE General Secretary Ignatius Leong poses

Afterwards, the critical bidding session came into the consideration. Turkey was candidate for 2009 World Junior Championships together with Argentina and Mexico but Turkey withdrew from the candidacy. In the most critical voting which was for 2009 World Youth Championship six of the nine bidders had already withdrawn and there were only 3 candidates: Argentina, Montenegro, Turkey.

 

Left:  From right to left Vice President and Chairman of EB Meeting Makropoulos, his excellency FIDE President Ilyumzhinov, FIDE Honorary President Florencio Campomannes and General Secretary Ignatius Leong Right: Eurasian Presidents together, Asia Continental President Sheikh Sultan Bin Halife El-Nehyan and President of European Chess Union Boris Kutin.

Argentina also made an intro ductory speech but later withdrew the bid possibly a return of the courtesy of Turkey in the morning session. There were only 2 candidates Montenegro and Turkey. ECU President Boris Kutin declared his clear preference for Montenegro due to the fact that this event would be the first big organization that Montenegro would organize. Newly elected FIDE Vice-President and TCF President Ali Nihat Yazıcı made a very short but effective point "We are not making any promises. You will see what we are capable of doing next week here." He also demanded a secret voting.

During the voting, FIDE President Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, TCF President and FIDE Vice President Ali Nihat Yazıcı and Boris Kutin, ECU President.

-"So this is 36." -"No, 37." The voting was over after this small chat between FIDE Director David Jarett and FIDE Treasurer Nigel Freeman.

 

ECU President Boris Kutin and Florencio Campomannes are waiting for the results. More excited ones about the result are General Secretary Hakan Aktaç and Honorary President of Turkish Chess Federation Kahraman Olgaç

The voting took place around 15.40 and the results of the voting was announced by FIDE Treasurer Nigel Freeman around 16.00 claiming that Turkey won the voting with 20 votes against 15. Afterwards, at the beginning of the voting procedure of 2009 World Team Championship Singapore, the other candidate which TCF has a memorandum of cooperation stepped down from candidacy.

 

After the voting, Ali Nihat Yazıcı, President of TCF was the happy one. On the right ECU President Kutin who explicitly supported Montenegro's Bid for 2009 World Youth Championship.

There was a gala dinner hosted by Turkish Chess Federation on the same day together with presentation of organizers of Dresden 2008 Chess Olmypiad, together with President of the Organizing Committee, Mayor Winfried Lehmann, President of the German Chess Federation Horst Metzing and Chairman of the Organizing Committee Dr Dirk Jordan were present and Lehmann delivered a presentation about the organization.  The President of the Turkish Chess Federation, Mr. Ali Nihat Yazicı dinner for all the participants, where he made a presentation of an Universal Chess Portal created by the Turkish Chess Federation for creating news, promoting chess events together with accomodation system in one hand and stressed that any Federation is welcome to join this system. The final presentation of the day was a video show by Vietnamese Chess Federation who are going to host the next World Youth Chess Championship.

On the third and thefinal day of the Executive Board, Continental Presidents delivered their speeches and organizers of Dresden signed the actual contracts with FIDE represented by Vice President Georgios Makropoulos and Treasurer Nigel Freeman.