Brisbane will host the 2032 Olympic Games after winning formal approval by the International Olympic Committee on Wednesday.
The Brisbane bid was ratified by a vote of 87 IOC members at a meeting in Tokyo before the opening of the Games on Friday, with IOC president Thomas Bach declaring the Queensland capital as host of both the Olympics and Paralympics in 11 years time.
“The International Olympic Committee has the honour to announce that the Games of the 35th Olympiad are awarded to Brisbane, Australia,” Bach said.
Needing to secure half the votes of its members, Brisbane was preferred ahead of Budapest, Korea, Doha and Germany’s Ruhr Valley, who had all expressed an interest in hosting the Games.
The Brisbane 2032 delegation, including AOC President John Coates and Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk, made a formal final presentation to the IOC meeting.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison addressed the meeting via a live link from Parliament House and spoke of the Australian government’s financial commitment to the Games.
“We know what it takes to deliver a successful Games in Australia,” Morrison said.
“We can draw confidence from Australia’s track record as delivering major sporting and global events that the Brisbane games will be safe and secure.”
He also described Australia’s multicultural population, with 300 ethnicities, as a “giant Olympic village”.
Coates, who is also an IOC vice-president, dubbed Brisbane “the together games” mixing modernity and the Olympics’ 136-year-old ideals.
While fireworks erupted in Brisbane, the reaction was more muted with the city confirmed back in February as the preferred host city and awarded exclusive negotiation rights ahead of its bidding rivals.
The IOC overhauled its bidding rules in 2019 to reduce costs and avoid pitting candidates against each other.
The city’s bid had earlier earned praise from the IOC for its high percentage of existing venues encompassing south-east Queensland, support from all levels of government and the private sector, experience in organising major events and its favourable weather.
Australia will become only the second country after the United States to host the Summer Olympics in three different cities.
Melbourne held the Games in 1956 and then Sydney in 2000.
Paris will stage the 2024 Games while Los Angeles has been awarded the 2028 edition.
-AAP