Gennady Golovkin Set to Be Elected International Boxing Leader, To Steer Boxing Towards Olympic Games in LA 2028
Ex-middleweight world titleholder Gennady Golovkin will be elected president of World Boxing and lead the sport as it heads toward the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.
Golovkin, who won Olympic silver in Athens in 2004 and achieved the most world title defences in middleweight history, is the only presidential candidate endorsed by the sport’s autonomous selection committee for the upcoming vote. As a result, he will take charge of the boxing governing body, which was established as the authority for amateur Olympic boxing recently.
That role was previously occupied by the International Boxing Association, but it was banished by the IOC in the year 2023 following a string of judging, corruption and governance scandals.
In his manifesto, the boxing veteran, whose initial term lasts through 2027, vowed to restore trust in the sport and ensure boxing’s future in the Olympic lineup, beginning at the Los Angeles 2028.
“As an amateur, I earned with pride a silver medal at the 2004 Athens Olympics, representing not only Kazakhstan but the values of fair play and discipline that characterize the sport,” he wrote. “As a professional, I became a multiple-time unified world champion, recognized for my honesty, sportsmanship, and dedication to fair play.
“I am committed to improving oversight, ensuring financial transparency, developing technology to ensure impartial scoring, and creating more chances for athletes of all genders in every region of the world.”
The International Olympic Committee directly managed the boxing events at the 2021 Tokyo Games and the Paris 2024 Games. Nonetheless, after last year’s Olympics were marred by disputes about gender eligibility, it said it needed a new partner in time for the 2028 Olympics.
In the month of February, it granted recognition to World Boxing, which then ran the 2025 world championships in Liverpool. For that event, World Boxing implemented compulsory gender verification, to determine the eligibility of male and female athletes, a move that the Olympic committee is also evaluating for LA 2028.
