Tamás Aján (born 12 January 1939) is the former President of the

International Weightlifting Federation The International Weightlifting Federation, aka IWF, is the international governing body for the sport of Weightlifting. Headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, it has 193 affiliated national federations. Mohammed Hasan Jalood has been its presid ...

from 2000 to 2020 and formerly a member of the

International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; , CIO) is the international, non-governmental, sports governing body of the modern Olympic Games. Founded in 1894 by Pierre de Coubertin and Demetrios Vikelas, it is based i ...

until 2010.

Early life and career

Born in

Gherla Gherla (; ; ) is a municipality in Cluj County, Romania (in the historical region of Transylvania). It is located from Cluj-Napoca on the river Someșul Mic, and has a population of 19,873 as of 2021. Three villages are administered by the city: ...

(Szamosújvár),

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

into an ethnic Hungarian family. Aján graduated from the Budapest University of Physical Education in 1964 with a Ph.D. in

physical education Physical education is an academic subject taught in schools worldwide, encompassing Primary education, primary, Secondary education, secondary, and sometimes tertiary education. It is often referred to as Phys. Ed. or PE, and in the United Stat ...

. He had a varied career in the Department of Sports and Ministry of Sports and Physical Education, as well as a number of academic posts. He was the

Secretary General Secretary is a title often used in organizations to indicate a person having a certain amount of authority, Power (social and political), power, or importance in the organization. Secretaries announce important events and communicate to the org ...

of the

Hungarian Olympic Committee The Hungarian Olympic Committee (, , MOB) is the National Olympic Committee representing Hungary. History The Hungarian Olympic Committee was founded on 19 December 1895, as sixth in the world, following the French, Greek, American, German a ...

from 1989 to 2005. From 1975 to 2000 he was Secretary General of the International Weightlifting Federation, and was the Federation's president from 2000 to 2020. As President, he was elected to the IOC in 2000. He has also served as a council member of the

World Anti-Doping Agency The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA; , AMA) is an international organization co-founded by the governments of over 140 nations along with the International Olympic Committee based in Canada to promote, coordinate, and monitor the fight against d ...

. He is also Vice President of the General Association of International Sports Federations (GAISF). In 2010 he received the

Olympic Order The Olympic Order, established in 1975, is the highest award of the Olympic Movement. It is awarded for particularly distinguished contributions to the Olympic Movement, i.e. recognition of efforts worthy of merit in the cause of sport. Tradit ...

on 28 February 2010 in

Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...

, British Columbia, Canada, this is awarded to individuals for particularly distinguished contribution to the Olympic Movement. Tamas Ajan married Marta Ajan in 1969 and they had 3 kids together: Andrea, Anita and Attila. He now also has 3 grandchildren: Panni Alexandra (2009), Emma Elizabeth (2014) and Milan (2021).

Corruption scandal

In January 2020, an undercover documentary aired on German TV which made serious allegations of financial malpractice and corruption of Anti-Doping Procedures against Aján. This led to him resigning as an IOC honorary member and temporarily stepping aside as president whilst an investigation, headed by professor Richard McLaren, was carried out. In a leaked email after stepping aside, it was alleged that Aján had made 'insults and implicit threats' to IWF interim-president Ursula Papandrea, including to have her arrested. He was also accused of taking part in conference calls, obstructing access to IWF bank accounts, overseeing a bank transfer, conducting “business as usual” with the IWF Secretariat in Budapest and interfering in the timing and venue of Board meetings all when he should not have done. On 15 April 2020, Aján resigned as President of the International Weightlifting Federation. Shortly before he resigned, it was claimed that Aján had withdrawn his annual salary of $413,000 plus a further $7,100 from the accounts of the IWF to his personal accounts, even though he was not authorised to do so. On 4 June 2020, professor Richard McLaren's independent report was published. The report stated that Aján operated a 'culture of fear' in his pursuit of 'absolute control' of the IWF. Aján was the General Secretary of the IWF between 1975 and 2000 however, the report said that he was the ''de facto'' President without the title during this time. This was demonstrated in 1982 when the IWF headquarters moved from Austria to Aján's country Hungary, despite the fact that the President was Austrian. The culture of fear was so strong that many IWF members refused to co-operate with the investigation and many of Aján's supporters had gained their positions in the IWF's executive board through vote-buying and bribes. Aján himself was said to have gained his re-election as president through vote buying on multiple occasions and his own son-in-law was the Director General of the IWF at the time of the investigation. The report stated that nowhere in the IWF constitution is there a position for a Director General as Aján created the position himself in 2014. The reports findings also concluded that Aján personally collected all anti-doping violation fines and that there was around $10.5 million unaccounted for in the IWF's accounts, as well as 41 positive doping tests that were covered up and 130 that were never processed, including two athletes who had won gold and silver medals at world championships. One instance in the report stated that members from the Albanian Weightlifting Federation drove from

Tirana Tirana ( , ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in Albania, largest city of Albania. It is located in the centre of the country, enclosed by mountains and hills, with Dajti rising to the east and a slight valley to the northwest ov ...

to Budapest with nearly $75,000 cash to pay an Anti-Doping fine to Aján so that Albania would not be banned from competing at the

2016 Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad () and officially branded as Rio 2016, were an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with preliminary events i ...

. Carrying such amounts of money over the border and not declaring it is a violation of Albanian law. All Anti-Doping information was passed to the

for investigation. In June 2021, Aján was officially charged with complicity and tampering with multiple ADRV's by the International Testing Agency along with other high ranking Weightlifting officials

Nicu Vlad Nicolae "Nicu" Vlad (born 1 November 1963) is a retired heavyweight weightlifter from Romania. He competed for Romania at the 1984, 1988, 1992 and 1996 Olympics and won a gold, a silver and a bronze medal. He won the world title in 1984, 1986 an ...

and Hasan Akkus. Aján and Vlad were later banned from weightlifting for life in June 2022 for their roles in covering up doping offences.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ajan, Tamas 1939 births Living people Hungarian International Olympic Committee members World Anti-Doping Agency members People from Gherla Recipients of the Olympic Order