http://www.chessninja.com/dailydirt...

<ChessBase is reproducing his reports with pictures. One of them shows FIDE prez Kirsan Ilyumzhinov chatting on one of those cell phones used by his voting delegates to send photos of their ballots so they could collect their bribes. Hey, it's not my story.>

Which links to this Nigel Short story...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/200...

<I find myself dwelling on some rather odd stories generated by the election: the senior federation official seen wandering around with large amounts of cash; the delegates who found it necessary to photograph their completed ballot papers and SMS the pictures to their colleagues before depositing their votes; and the delegates present who chose to deliver their proxies to the fiercely pro-Kirsan delegates rather than voting in person themselves. Of course, there may not have been any shenanigans. Elections, however, must not only be clean, but be seen to be clean, and it is high time to appoint an independent authority to ensure this.>

"..."Where does all the money go?" asks Karpov and examines the annual FIDE budget of around three million dollars, "mostly collected from the federations." According to FIDE <just 8% went to chess development.> Karpov also doubts Ilyumzhinov's claim that he has spent tens of millions in personal investments in chess.

The most explosive part of the article touches on "campaign tricks", which according to Karpov include

"...offering personal financial rewards to federation leaders; using FIDE money and resources on the campaign in which FIDE is officially neutral; threatening federations who might support his opponents with the loss of development funds and events; even physical threats against delegates. In fact, many of the federations that Kirsan currently claims to have the support of are simply too afraid of reprisals to make their opposition known. Several of them have expressed their support of Karpov’s candidacy confidentially and are biding their time to announce their decision in due course. This casts serious doubt on the total vote count claimed by Kirsan’s campaign."

Finally Karpov says Kirsan is still falsely claiming "he was nominated by the Russian Federation, when in reality the only official nomination from Russia went to Anatoly Karpov." He reminds readers that the Karpov campaign is seeking to disqualify Kirsan and his ticket Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne. "We will comment further if and when permitted to do so," the article ominously ends."

<Ilyumzhinov is a generator of crazy ideas and we’re impatiently waiting for the arrival of someone competent who won’t communicate with aliens and who’ll look at Kalmykia not from Alpha Centauri but from here, from the Earth.>

Also worth a look if you've ever wondered how vodka and Buddhism mix...

69 times! Any idea on who else he has been? Leo Tolstoy? Catharine the Great? Yakoff Smirnov?

Without the resources of Kalmyk, though, it will be interesting to see how many of these Federation heads really like Kirsan. This is assuming he was stealing money from the poor, central Asian country and buying influence in the chess world, as is widely suspected.

Lots more on Kirsan here: http://www.chessintranslation.com/2...

The central authorities only took an interest again in 1997 when it suddenly emerged that in this entity of the Russian Federation a certain “black hole” had formed, through which money was rushing away. Attempts by the Treasury to explain the fate of the <200 million roubles that had disappeared> from the Kalmyk National Bank ended with another protest by Kirsan, who threatened that his republic would break away from the Russian Federation. […]

Meanwhile, according to the latest statistics (for 2009), in terms of average monthly income <the republic is in 81st place out of 81 regions, and is 80th in terms of unemployment.> In general, the businessman-dreamer didn’t work out as a “father of the people”. So they decided to give him the chance to deal with what he loves more than anything else – studying “black holes” in space. It’s better than creating them on the Earth.

Seems fine, I like commenting here, although I'm a little distressed by the lack of comments considering the importance (imho) of this election.

Let's take Cambodia. Cambodia is not a tiny country, but it has one FIDE registerd player: Noel Pinic. (Sorry to single him out. With all due respect though; he's a stronger player than I am. I could have also picked Jon O'Neill, who makes up an "Army of Jon" from Sierra Leone). Noel Pinic's voting strength is identical to that of the Russian Federation. How much does it cost to buy Noel Pinic's vote? Or that of the half-dozen other people somehow associated with FIDE in Cambodia? A free dinner? A chess clock? A free plane ticket and all-inclusive vacation to get him to the voting site? (THAT would be sweet. I read the Buddhists and vodka article!)

Do you think Noel Pinic is actively policing himself against possible unethical behavior? Will Noel Pinic let down Noel Pinic by choosing an inefficient autocrat over a visionary reformer? Is Noel Pinic not swayed by Karpov's stirring rhetoric, written in English and Russian, which Noel Pinic may or may not be familiar with?