Rosenstein Raises Alarm Over Last-Minute FIDE Election Changes while FIDE Blames Local Organizers for Disorganization
By Robby B. · Wed, 16 Sep 2026
FIDE presidential candidate Wadim Rosenstein has stated that FIDE is considering last-minute changes to the upcoming election while shifting responsibility for organizational problems in Samarkand onto local organizers.
FIDE presidential candidate Wadim Rosenstein has raised serious concerns over what he says is an attempt to change the conditions of the upcoming FIDE election at the last minute, while shifting responsibility for organizational failures at the Chess Olympiad onto the local organizers in Uzbekistan.The FIDE presidential election has long been scheduled to take place during the General Assembly in Samarkand on September 26. FIDE publicly announced the location and dates months ago and subsequently confirmed that the election would take place there.Against that background, Rosenstein says discussions about changing the location or arrangements for the Congress and election just days before voting deserve particular scrutiny. His argument is straightforward: problems surrounding the Olympiad should not become a justification for suddenly changing an electoral process that candidates and national federations have been preparing for throughout the campaign.Rosenstein is also challenging attempts to place responsibility for the current logistical problems primarily on the Uzbek organizers.That point is particularly significant because FIDE's own official Olympiad documentation states that teams would be allocated to hotels by FIDE. The Congress documentation similarly says that hotel allocation for eligible delegates would be handled by FIDE.Accommodation, accreditation and visa problems have undeniably occurred. FIDE Interim President Viswanathan Anand acknowledged at the opening press conference that teams had experienced difficulties and said FIDE was working together with the local organizing committee to resolve them.Rosenstein's intervention therefore puts the focus on a different question: who was actually responsible for the decisions that produced those problems?His position is that Uzbekistan should not be made the scapegoat for failures involving responsibilities that FIDE itself controlled, particularly if those same problems are then cited as grounds for altering the election arrangements.With the vote only days away, any change to the venue, accreditation process, voting arrangements or timetable would inevitably attract attention. Rosenstein is calling for the election to proceed under the rules and conditions that were announced in advance, and for FIDE to explain transparently who made the decisions behind the organizational problems now unfolding in Samarkand.What began as complaints about hotels and accreditation has therefore developed into a much larger issue: whether logistical chaos is now being used as the justification for changing one of the most consequential FIDE elections in years.