Games hopeful: $5000 now or I quit and you all miss the Olympics
June 13, 2012
A MELBOURNE weightlifter has been accused of threatening to sabotage the Olympic chances of the entire Australian weightlifting team if he was not paid thousands of dollars.
In an extraordinary series of backroom developments during the Oceania Weightlifting Championships in Samoa last week - which doubled as an Olympic trial - Daniel Koum is alleged to have asked for $5000 cash just 40 minutes before his opening lift. Koum is alleged to have threatened to not compete if he didn't receive the money.
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His failure to participate would have prevented any Australian male weightlifter competing at next month's Olympic Games in London.
Koum last night denied the allegations. But Michael Keelan, chief executive of the Australian Weightlifting Federation, confirmed the incident.
Mr Keelan would not name the athlete involved, but other sources confirmed it was Koum, a 26-year-old Melbourne-based weightlifter originally from Cameroon who became an Australian citizen in 2008.
The event finished on Saturday in Apia, with Australia eventually winning by six points, ahead of Kiribati and Fiji. Australia had to finish in the top five at the event to earn a solitary men's spot at the London Games.
If Koum had failed to accrue any points, the Australians would have finished well down the ladder.
Australia has now earned a spot for one athlete to go to London. Who takes that place will be decided at a final qualifying event this weekend in Brisbane, but it is believed that Koum was out of contention for the Olympic spot when he made his alleged demand.
It is understood a member of the support team in Apia learned of Koum's plan after the weightlifter told a member of a competing nation, who in turn informed the Australians.
To head off the move, it is believed team coaches offered Koum a reward of $1000 - to be paid out of their own pockets - for him to lift a total of 250 kilograms in his event, the 62-kilogram weight division.
After initially agreeing to that arrangement, Koum allegedly then demanded before his lift that he be paid $5000.
The money was found and paid to Koum, who performed well enough in the competition to give Australia a victory and a spot in the London Games.
But the fallout has just begun, with an internal investigation being launched amid various weightlifting stakeholders yesterday.
Sources declined to reveal precisely how the money paid to Koum was raised, but said it would be repaid out of the personal bank accounts of a group of team officials and coaches.
When confronted with the allegation, Koum said: "I deny that."
The remaining team members continued the competition and were only told of the situation later at their hotel.
Koum did not travel home with the team and returned to Melbourne the day after the bulk of the squad.
Fellow lifters and Australian Weightlifting Federation officials are said to be stunned at the alleged actions of Koum, and sources say his alleged demand is unprecedented in the sport's history in Australia.
On his website, Koum describes himself as an elite weightlifter from Cameroon who took up the sport in his father's gym at age 15.
He went on to represent Cameroon at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and stayed in the country, gaining his citizenship in 2008.
He missed the team for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing but qualified for the 2010 Commonwealth Games in Delhi, where he narrowly missed a medal.
