Jesse Reed
Infrastructure has been a major issue at the 2016 Rio Olympics, including the network of Olympic volunteers that grease the wheels.
According to Kim Brunhuber of CBC News, 30 percent of the 50,000 Olympic volunteers haven’t been showing up for work.
One such former volunteer, Luis Moreira, explained why so many have bowed out.
“Many volunteers had to quit because they had to work two weeks in a row, schedules were messed up, lots of people quit because of the food: they were told to work eight, nine hours and were only provided with a little snack,” Moreira says. “I don’t think the organizing committee had enough consideration for people’s lives and welfare. It was as though the organizing committee was doing us a favour. The committee uses the volunteers to make money, uses us for free labour.”
That there isn’t enough food for the volunteers is baffling, considering the International Olympic Committee has hauled in “more than $5.6 billion the past four years,” per Brunhuber.
Additionally, while the IOC admits it could handle things differently when it comes to actually paying the volunteers, it has no intention of doing so.
“Volunteers are the backbone of the Games,” says IOC director of communications Mark Adams. “We could do it a different way. But I think volunteers are something we really do appreciate.”
They sure have a nice way of showing it.
This is just an unacceptable situation. Making it worse is the fact that these volunteers who are putting in long, thankless hours while getting nothing but a snack to sustain them are also being censored. The IOC is reportedly keeping its volunteers from speaking to media about the conditions.
It’s not hard to see why many of the people who signed up to be Olympic volunteers have opted out at this point. In fact, given this information, it is quite remarkable that more haven’t followed suit.
