WPBSA x IBSF

A few days ago, August the 9th to be exact, the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA) stated that it's chairman, Mr Jason Ferguson, had resigned from the presidency of the World Confederation of Billiards Sports (WCBS). Through Jason Ferguson, who has a couple times before featured here, the Blog ROSBrazil Snooker had exclusive access to letters between the WPBSA and the IBSF, organisations that split it's partnership on the 31st of July.

I will not show the full contents of the letters here, but I'll try to tell what's happened using some quotes from Jason Ferguson (after WCBS resignment, representing the WPBSA), explaining them without taking sides. Here we go:

Firstly you need to know that the WPBSA and the IBSF had a "memorandum of
understanding" (MoU) in practice, and Mr Ferguson - making it clear that the "WPBSA is
a not for profit international sports federation and any money generated is reinvested back into the sport." - claims "The WPBSA has used it's Presidency of the WCBS since 2015 to attempt to improve the standards of governance, financial management and professionalism at the WCBS to the levels expected by the IOC [International Olympic Committee], with the key aim of providing a platform for billiard sports to succeed in an application to be included in future Olympic Games."
According to the WPBSA, Ferguson helped Billiards to come "from a handful of entrants in one or two events to a tour which included the reinstatement of the official World Billiards Rankings."

Things were going as planned until IBSF decided to replace it's former President, Mr Maxim, for Mr. Mubarak Al Khayarin from January the 8th, 2017.
Apparently Mr Khayarin did not like the idea of incorporating the new World Snooker Federation (WSF) - an organisation with the goal of founding Snooker in new countries in order to fit with the IOC standards and become an Olympic sport - as he was afraid it might replace IBSF itself.
Then IBSF decided to end its commitment to work under the MoU with the WPBSA, effective from April the 28th - and claiming that the WPBSA did not help them enough with their events, they started to try and call themselves Snooker's official international organisation.

Mr Ferguson replies that with: "the WPBSA has acted as a governing body to the World Snooker Tour for many years, as well as supporting many amateur federations and sports development initiatives. The only other body which has previously been considered the official governing body of billiard sports in the world was the Billiards and Snooker Control Council, the business and assets of which (including but not limited to all intellectual property and other rights to snooker and English Billiards) were acquired by the WPBSA in the 1990’s. In fact, our roots as an official world governing body can be traced as far back as 1875."

IBSF accusations includes: "that the WPBSA did not abide by its agreement with IBSF", "interfered in the internal affairs of IBSF more than once", and "continued to make IBSF champions sign unfair contracts to grant them wild cards without considering the interests of their national federations." WPBSA denies that and asks for examples.
The IBSF also alleges that the WPBSA “extended financial and media aid to several organisations to organise events, world women championships and English Billiards championship which acted against the interests of IBSF”. Mr Ferguson says "the WPBSA owns the World Ladies Billiards and Snooker Association and the official Women’s World Snooker Championship and has run successful events for many years. The WPBSA proposed that the women’s game could be developed further through the WSF, but the IBSF made it clear to us that it had no interest in being involved."

As for Mr Khayarin's accusations that "the WPBSA did not try to support IBSF or continental federations with regard to wild cards and spots for the IBSF players in the 6-Red Championship for professionals", WPBSA alleges that "the IBSF did supply players to both the 6 Reds Championship, but the demands of the sponsors and broadcasters resulted in the need for the entry criteria to be changed."

Jason Ferguson claims that after a meeting with the IBSF on the 26th July in Poland, during the World Games, he'd been sure that the IBSF was committed to the principle of a new MoU with the WPBSA, but the following day he "received, without warning, two seemingly deliberately-timed written notices from the IBSF in which the IBSF asserted that the IBSF had ceased discussions in relation to a new memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the WPBSA and the IBSF in relation to the World Snooker Federation (the WSF) and erroneously purported to take control of snooker’s membership in the WCBS (to the exclusion of the WPBSA)."

Without any support from the WCBS and the IBSF, accusing them of being "plainly unlawful and unconstitutional", Mr Ferguson decided to resign from the WCBS presidency, and ended his letter to Mr Khayarin's with strong lines:
"The WPBSA has not tried to “erase the IBSF from the world snooker scene”. In line with the feedback from the IOC, the WPBSA does strongly believe that one worldwide governing body for snooker is a necessary step to maximise its chances of attaining an Olympic place. The WPBSA also believes that, due to the WCBS’s refusal to comply with IOC-recognised governance best practice, there is now no question that new arrangements will need to be put in place to achieve the Olympic ambitions.
The WPBSA remains fully committed to the worldwide growth and development of billiard sports and to working towards the ultimate goal of seeing billiard sports included within the Olympics.
The recent deeply regrettable IBSF actions and correspondence will only serve to further marginalise the role of the IBSF in pursuing those goals."


This is it, I hope it's made things clearer for you to make out your own opinion on the subject.
I heard many people say after Ferguson left the WCBS presidency that it meant Snooker's dream to get into the Olympics was over. I'll be coming back here in the blog within the next few days for some analysis on what impact all these latest news will make on the sport and it's Olympic intentions. Follow us on Facebook or Twitter to know when it'll come out.