UCI staff drafted language for UCI constitution amendment proposal

UCI staff drafted the Malaysian Cycling Federation's proposal to change the UCI constitution's provisions for electing its President. The proposal would allow national federations to nominate non-members for the post, and would also be effective retrospectively.

Pat McQuaid is running for a third term as UCI President. The Irish federation withdrew its nomination of him. The Swiss federation then nominated him, but that is under judicial review. It was also recently disclosed that he has been a member of that federation only since the Irish federation withdrew its support.

The Thai and Moroccan federations then nominated McQuaid, raising further questions as to the legality of federations nominating non-members, and doing so past the deadline nomination. The Malaysian federation thereupon proposed amending the UCI constitution to allow such nominations.

However, insidethegames.biz reported that UCI staff were heavily involved in the proposal, naming UCI general director Christophe Hubschmid and head of legal service Amina Lanaya.

"I note from section 4 of the rationale for the proposal that it is the Malaysian National Cycling Federation's intention that the proposed amendment, if accepted, applies to the elections that will take place at the 2013 Congress," they wrote in on June 27 to Hee Wook Cho, President of the Asian Cycling Confederation and Datuk Haji Abu Samah Wahab, head of the Malaysian federation.

"Therefore, I would ask you to consider adding a transitional clause to your amendment, so as to enable National Federations to nominate candidates under the proposed amendment in case it should be accepted by the 2013 Congress to apply to the elections that will take place at that Congress."

They then “suggested” wording for the proposal, and both the ACC and Malaysian federation adopted that exact wording.

An unidentified UCI spokesman told the website that the suggested wording was to prevent ambiguity in the proposal. "The proposal and accompanying rationale which was initially put forward by the Malaysian Federation - as you will have seen - sought to ensure that the proposal came into immediate force and that it was applied to the 2013 elections.

"In practice this would have allowed new candidates to be proposed for the Presidential election immediately after the possible passing of the Malaysian amendment - potentially minutes before the election for the new President.”

The proposal changes the deadline for nominations from June 29, 2013, until August 30, 2013. The Thai and Moroccan nominations were first announced on July 29, a month past the original deadline, but McQuaid apparently claims to have received them earlier.