Motor sport: FIA boss to step back from daily Formula One management
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FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem sent a letter to F1 teams announcing that he would give up the day-to-day management of Formula One.
PHOTO: REUTERS
PARIS – FIA president Mohammed Ben Sulayem will step back from the daily management of Formula One, his organisation confirmed on Wednesday, as tensions between the sport and its governing body soar following controversies involving the Emirati.
An FIA spokesman confirmed with AFP media reports that Ben Sulayem sent a letter to F1 teams, announcing that he would give up the day-to-day management of motor sports.
The plan was “clearly stated” before his 2021 election in a manifesto where he promised to nominate an FIA director-general and introduce a “revised governance structure” under a team based on “transparency, democracy and growth”, the spokesman added.
The BBC and Sky Sports quoted Ben Sulayem detailing the changes in a letter, seen by them, to the 10 teams.
“My stated objective was to be a non-executive president via the recruitment of a team of professional managers, which has now been largely completed,” he said.
“Therefore, going forward, your day-to-day contact for all matters on F1 will be with (head of single-seater racing) Nikolas (Tombazis) and his team, while I will focus on strategic matters with my leadership team.”
Governing body FIA in January unveiled an overhaul of its department responsible for single-seater racing under the leadership of Tombazis.
The announcement comes as the FIA and F1’s American owners Liberty Media are at loggerheads over a series of controversies involving Ben Sulayem.
The FIA chief sparked a spat with Liberty Media in January, when he described as “an inflated price tag” a report in Bloomberg that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund had tried and failed to buy F1 for US$20 billion (S$26.5 billion).
According to media reports, a letter by Liberty Media and F1 to the FIA said the remarks interfered in an “unacceptable” way with a commitment not to harm commercial rights.
The FIA has also sparked unease in some quarters by updating its rules to prevent “political, religious or personal” comments by F1 drivers without earlier approval.
F1 boss Stefano Domenicali told British newspaper The Guardian on Tuesday that the sport would “never gag anyone”.
Decades-old sexist comments attributed to Ben Sulayem also recently surfaced in the media from an old personal website that had been archived. AFP, REUTERS
