Residents of the Hanseatic city rejected in a referendum on Sunday the proposal to submit a candidacy to the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB) to host the 2036, 2040 or 2044 Games, with 54.9 per cent voting against and turnout at 49.5 per cent.
The result removes Hamburg from Germany’s internal process just before the 4 June deadline, when it was due to present its concept to the body, and narrows the national race to Berlin, Munich and the Rhine-Ruhr region, from which the DOSB will choose on 26 September the bid it will take into the international phase.
According to the official result cited by the DOSB, 652,603 of the 1,315,800 eligible voters took part in the vote and the 293,819 votes in favour fell far short of the required majority.
Mayor Peter Tschentscher accepted defeat that same evening and announced the withdrawal.
“The people of Hamburg have decided that the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg should not bid for Olympic and Paralympic Summer Games,” he said, before adding that the mandate was binding on the Senate and that he had already informed DOSB President Thomas Weikert and German International Olympic Committee member Michael Mronz.
Tschentscher regretted the outcome, but maintained that the city would continue to pursue those advances without the impetus of the Games.
Within the political camp that had defended the bid, the blow was met with disappointment, but also with immediate acceptance of the verdict.
Katharina Fegebank, second mayor, described it as “a bitter disappointment and a missed opportunity for our city”, although she stressed that the vote must be respected and that Hamburg would support the city or region nominated by the DOSB.
Andy Grote, senator for the interior and sport, thanked the volunteers, athletes and organisations that had defended the project and noted that more than 250,000 citizens had backed the idea of a “Festival of diversity and sport in the heart of the city”, but admitted that it had not been enough.
In the Hamburg Parliament, the result was interpreted less as a sporting defeat than as a settled democratic decision. Its president, Carola Veit, was unequivocal in stating that “now the message is clear: Hamburg should not bid”, and added that “there will be no second-guessing”.
For Veit, the vote prevented parliament and the senate from moving forward for years against the will of the majority.
The political blow is greater because it repeats, more emphatically, the precedent of 2015, when Hamburg also rejected a bid for the 2024 Games, with 51.6 per cent voting against and 48.4 per cent in favour, on turnout of 50.2 per cent.
This time, opposition prevailed in all seven districts, a figure that turned the defeat of the red-green senate into a setback across the board.-insidethegames
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