MADRID, 23 Ago. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Administrative Court of Sport (TAD) has ordered that the presidential elections of the Royal Spanish Table Tennis Federation (RFETM) return to the point just before the deadline for submitting candidacies, in order to repeat the entire process, after having accepted the appeal that candidate Manuel Pereiro Pérez had previously submitted.
According to ‘Iusport’ on its website this Friday, the repetition of these elections is reflected in a resolution of the TAD dated August 13. Pereiro Pérez’s appeal went against a previous agreement of the Electoral Board of the RFETM, which had proclaimed the provisional candidacies for that presidential election.
“The appellant requested that the guarantees submitted to the Electoral Board by the candidate Miguel Ángel Machado, dated prior to his resignation as president of the RFETM Management Committee or with defects of authenticity, be annulled,” ‘Iusport’ stated in its news item.
According to the TAD resolution, it also requested that a disciplinary file be opened against Machado for alleged “abuse of power by requesting endorsements taking advantage of his position as President of the Managing Committee” and before the Electoral Board “for not ensuring that the electoral process is in accordance with the law.”
On October 27, 2023, and in accordance with a ruling by the National Court, the June 2021 elections in which Machado was re-elected to his presidential office violated the rights of 269 voters. Despite this, the TAD now recalled its lack of jurisdiction to initiate disciplinary proceedings ex officio and following a private complaint.
The TAD is indeed competent to, in its own words, “process and resolve disciplinary proceedings, ultimately administrative, at the request of the president of the Higher Sports Council –José Manuel Rodríguez Uribes– or its Board of Directors.”
‘Iusport’ then added that, since this is a complaint filed by a private individual, the TAD “must declare the appeal inadmissible as regards the third and fourth claims of the appeal.”
The TAD points out that the candidacy presented by Machado “suffers from a defect in form that determines its voidability”, since most of its endorsements “are dated July 18, 2024, that is, prior to the date of the presentation of the candidacy on July 25.”
That is to say, and as ‘Iusport’ stressed, “the majority of the assembly members presented their endorsement in favor of a candidacy that, at the date of signing the aforementioned endorsement, did not exist,” which “vitiates the validity of the endorsements, by showing their support for someone who, as of June 18, did not have the status of candidate.”
Therefore, the TAD understands that Machado’s candidacy “does not meet the requirements set forth in article 17.4 of the Electoral Order, since the endorsements submitted by the candidate in question suffer from the required formal defect”; and this invalidates said candidacy.
Since Machado’s candidacy was the only one admitted, the TAD indicated that “it is appropriate to annul it and order the retroactive action of the electoral process to the moment immediately prior to the start of the period for the presentation of candidacies,” as ‘Iusport’ finally revealed regarding this resolution.