Sergey Bubka presents Svetlana Feofanova with a 50,000 US dollars cheque (© Getty Images)
At 8.15pm this evening at a ceremony at UNESCO’s Headquarters, UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura will, in the presence of Mykola Kostenko, Minister of Physical Education and Sport of Ukraine, name Ukraine’s World Pole Vault record holder and IAAF Council Member Sergey Bubka as a UNESCO Champion for Sport.
The appointment recognizes “Bubka’s role in the promotion of peace and tolerance through sport and the Olympic spirit, his humanitarian activities in favour of young people, his action to enable disadvantaged children to benefit from physical education and his dedication to the Organization’s ideas.”
Bubka the six time World champion (1983, 1987, 1991, 1993, 1995 and 1997), European champion (1986) and Olympic champion (1988, Seoul), who passed the six-metre mark 44 times in his career, became an international star of Athletics. He went on to found the annual international competition “The Pole Vault Stars” in Donetsk, Ukraine.
Named “Champion of Champions” by the French sports daily, l’Equipe, the three times “World Sportman of the Year”, has two sons. He has created a Children’s Sports Club in Donetsk which now has 300 members, and he is also a member of the Public Regional Coordination council for Social Protection of Disabled Children and Orphans.
Dubbed the “Vaulting Czar”, Bubka has left an indelible mark on athletics at the end of the 20th century, and having retired from competition in early 2001, he was elected in the following year to the ‘Verkhovna Rada’ (Parliament of the Ukraine) and also became a Counsellor to the Prime Minister.
In 2002, Mr Bubka became the first Ukrainian Chairman of the Athletes’ Commission of the International Olympic Committee (IOC). Created in 1981, the Committee serves to link competing Olympic athletes and the IOC which is engaged in, among other things, the fight against doping, the promotion of women’s participation in the Olympic movement and environmental protection.
The other athletes who have been named UNESCO Champions for Sport are French judo star David Douillet (2001), and German Formula 1 driver, Michael Schumacher (2002). While Brazilian footballer, Edson Arantes do Nascimiento, also known as “King Pelé” has been a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador since 1994.
UNESCO
