The International Hockey Federation (FIH) was invited at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s two-day conference on Safeguarding Sport from Corruption held on 3-4 September in Vienna, Austria, to speak about lessons learned from its efforts on strengthening good governance and integrity within hockey.
Among the high-profile speakers was Valérie Horyna, FIH Senior Legal Counsel, who introduced FIH’s work in terms of good governance and shared advice on how to strengthen governance in sport. She spoke about the setup of FIH’s Integrity Unit in 2018 and its work bound to the FIH Integrity Code. This Code sets out general obligations as well as anti-corruption rules and applies to anyone involved in the activities of FIH. Moreover, she gave insights about FIH’s continuously growing anti-doping programme, its Gender Equality Policy and further good governance programmes that FIH is currently putting in place.
“International sports federations must implement good governance within their organization to steer their sport in an increasingly challenging environment. FIH has shown its strong commitment to that by creating its independent Integrity Unit last year”, Valérie Horyna said after the event.
The conference was attended by 60 Member States of UNODC, sports organisations and relevant stakeholders to discuss the progress on the implementation of UN resolution 7/8 on corruption in sport and, where applicable, other efforts to safeguard sport as they relate to the 2030 UN Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Through its Global Programme on Safeguarding Sport from Crime and Corruption, the UNODC responds to the need for multi-stakeholder approaches for standard-setting and capacity-building. The resolution - supported by 183 Member States - represents a major milestone in addressing corruption in sport and covers a wide range of issues including illegal betting, whistleblowing, good governance and competition manipulation.
