Castellani to Offer Resignation to Turin Olympic Board

(TORINO, November 4 2004) – After the meeting held last night in Palazzo Chigi (Rome), the president of TOROC Valentino Castellani today held a press conference during which he stated that on the occasion of the coming Board of Directors he will offer up his mandate as president.

‘With the meeting held yesterday in Rome, – declared Mr. Castellani – I believe that for TOROC a phase is closing and another is being opened. The powers that have been agreed and assigned to Mario Pescante, even if still to be formalized from a juridical point of view, are to be considered as a real supervision and therefore are equivalent to a distrust in the work done so far and especially in the ability to continue it. For this reason,
I have decided that on November 24th I will offer up my mandate as President of TOROC to the Board of Directors, which will have then the task of defining who will be at the head of TOROC’.

‘With this action – he added – I hope and think to contribute to clear the situation up and to truly turn the page, at a little bit more than one year to the beginning of the Winter Olympic Games. During these years, and also during these last months, I have witnessed numerous attacks to my person and to the professionalism of TOROC. I have always tried to look ahead, to build a common consent, to respect everybody, sometimes at the detriment of my image, not listening to the suggestions of who asked me to be more aggressive, more polemic, more combative.
I have always tried to give priority to the work that had to be done, to facts, to commitment and, above all, to the awareness of working for a great opportunity for our City, for the Region and, of course, for Italy. Now, it is enough. There is no need to keep on walking this road. A position of responsibility as mine cannot be held without the trust and the support of all the actors that have responsibility in the organization of the Olympic Games’.

Mr. Castellani found words for the organization, recognizing the work done so far: ‘Whoever is destined to cover a role of command and responsibility in TOROC will find at his disposal an organization in the position of reaching with success the goal that it was born for. With full awareness, I would like to reassure all the people that follow us with interest and passion saying that the Games will take place, with success. It is now urgent to overcome this phase and continue with the job that remains to be done’.

For more details contact:

Mary Villa
Media Relations Manager – International Desk
TOROC
Organising Committee for the XX Olympic Winter Games – Torino 2006
phone: +39 011 1124 916
mobile: +39 335 1500714
www.torino2006.org