English Chess Federation The Watch Oak, Chain Lane, Battle, East Sussex, TN33 0YD, United Kingdom Telephone +44 (0) 1424 775222, Facsimile +44 (0) 1424 775904
Chief Executive
The English Chess Federation is a limited company registered in England and Wales (5293039) and affiliated with the Fédération Internationale des Échecs.
FIDE General Assembly Presidential Election and FIDE Academies
The ECF Board reiterates its support for Garry Kasparov as the next FIDE president. We firmly believe that Mr Kasparov's ticket, their integrity, vision and his status as the longest reigning World Chess Champion, will inspire and unite us to effectively promote chess.
The advent of FIDE Academies illustrates a significant difference between Mr Kasparov’s approach to developing policy and the incumbent administration’s approach. The current one-size- fits-all guidelines interfere with the internal affairs of some national chess federations, such as ours. For example, our strategy to develop mutually supportive cohorts of young players includes the incentive of national performance targets for players to achieve prior to representing their country in the official FIDE youth championships. Current guidelines allow FIDE Academies in England to circumvent those targets by sending unqualified players to represent their country in the official FIDE championships. Guidelines that encourage FIDE Academies to recommend Candidate Master titles directly to FIDE weakens the credibility of that title and undermines FIDE member federations. Additionally, our good standing in England as the national governing body for chess is threatened by conferring official status to groups that do not operate to accepted norms in England’s sport, recreation or education sectors. Details of our draft policy for FIDE Academies to prosper in England may be seen on the ECF Forum at this link.
Colleagues in the FIDE General Assembly: Kindly reflect on the unintended consequences of allowing our international headquarters to override national federations. The ECF respectfully requests that you support our motion, 2.5 in the FIDE Trainers’ Commission report, and reject item 2.4. Awarding FIDE Academy status in that case is premature.
This issue is an example of the dysfunction rendered by the incumbent leadership. A FIDE Presidential Board led by Mr Kasparov would rectify skewed relationships, build more cooperative and dynamic networks and transform our collective ethos. It is time to change.
Phil Ehr Chief Executive English Chess Federation
London, 22 July 2014