Sheikh Ahmad loses on every count: CAS upholds suspension over OCA election meddling

The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) has fully upheld the three-year suspension imposed on Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Ahmed Al-Sabah by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). The appeal lodged by the long-standing and now former Kuwaiti IOC member against the IOC Executive Board's decision of July 2023 has been dismissed. Three years ago, while still under suspension, Ahmad had influenced the presidential election of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) in favour of his brother Sheikh Talal Fahad Al-Hamad Al-Sabah.

The award makes public for the first time that, in parallel to the CAS proceedings, Ahmad had filed another civil action before a Swiss court. In Ahmad's decades-long, gigantic chronicle of misconduct, ethics entanglements and court rulings, this is yet another aperçu. The Cour d'appel civile du Tribunal cantonal vaudois confirmed the stay of these Lausanne parallel proceedings. The award CAS 2023/A/9931, which was not accompanied by any press release but recently surfaced in the incomplete list of decisions, is the only publicly accessible source for this matter.

The Lausanne suit is more than a procedural footnote. By opening the action before the Tribunal d'arrondissement de Lausanne on the very day he completed his CAS appeal, Ahmad set up a two-track strategy: the CAS filing presented as a mere precaution to preserve deadlines, the Swiss civil court framed as the proper forum to litigate the substance — and, in the meantime, to stretch the proceedings out for as long as possible. The award is yet another illustration of a pattern long visible across Ahmad's other cases, in Geneva and beyond: drag the proceedings out until their contours dissolve.