BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
Olympic Games Sarajevo 1984 – Helping Bosnia Heal
Aljoša Žvirc
JOURNALIST AT THE ADRIATIC
The first association with sports in Bosnia and Herzegovina are surely the 1984 Winter Olympic games in Sarajevo.
The city was given an image boost as the Games helped update its infrastructure
and lift its passion for sport. Many major foreign sponsors like Coca
Cola, Kodak, American Cyanimid, Miller Brewing Co. and U.S. Tobacco Co. saw
it fit to invest in the biggest sporting event in the history of Yugoslavia. People
flocked to watch the games that cost around USD 111m in 1984. The Bosnian war later left destruction and the heritage of sport was severely damaged
and compromised. Yet with the strong will of the people, along with the help of the Olympic movement and the investment from the International Olympic
Committee (IOC), Sarajevo restored its sporting legacy. Aid came from
the city of Barcelona, which helped rebuild and redevelop the Olympic
Village in Mojmilo, that was left in ruins by the war.
The cities are now forever bound as ‘twins’ since 2000. The IOC also invested more than USD 10m into the reconstruction of the Zetra Olympic Hall, which was named after the late former IOC president Juan Antonio Samaranch right after his death in 2010. The bobsleigh and luge facilities were also destroyed and later restored and are now a popular training base for other teams. The city never lost its Olympic spirit, as it motivates and drives people to get involved in sports, to train or just be passionate fans. And most important of all, the different ways of collaboration it provided are transmitted from generation to generation.
Official logo of Winter Olympics Sarajevo 1984.
(Photo: Shutterstock)
Telemach: Loyal to athletes, clubs and federations
Telemach, the leading video provider and fastest growing mobile operator in Slovenia, has been a big supporter of sports since the very start of its business. Its sponsorship portfolio in Slovenia is quite dispersed as they try to help and support as many clubs, associations, individuals, and organizers of sports events as possible. Among other things, they are the golden sponsor of the Slovenian Nordic national team, which has been inspiring winter sports fans for many years. It was already in their first year of sponsorship, for example, that the Slovenian ski jumper Peter Prevc achieved the greatest success of his career. “We also committed ourselves to take care of the development and progress of young promising ski jumpers, which we also proved with the campaign Let’s renew ski jumps across Slovenia.
And here, of course, is basketball. Telemach became the general sponsor of the Basketball Association of Slovenia in 2004. We were also joyful and proud together with the Slovenian national basketball team, as they gained their greatest success by winning the European Championship in 2017. We started a joint journey with the tennis association in Slovenia in 2015. And in 2021, we remain a loyal companion of athletes and sports organizations, ”says Adrian Ježina, president of the Management Board of Telemach.
THE ADRIATIC
This article was originally published in The Adriatic Journal: Strategic Foresight 2021
If you want a copy, please contact us at info@adriaticjournal.com.
