In an unexpected twist in the Van Paesschen vs. Belgian Federation case, the Belgian Equestrian Federation has now decided that they will not send Constant van Paesschen to the Alltech World Equestrian Games afterall.
After not being selected for the Belgian team for the World Equestrian Games, Constant van Paesschen along with his owners, Immnivest, took legal action. Today, the Belgian Court of Arbitration for Sport decided that Constant should be on the team, only then to revoke that decision. Following the initial decision, the Federation determined that the arbitration decision would not be able to be carried out. The reasoning behind this decision is that the Belgian Federation would be required to remove one of the other selected combinations without reason.
The Belgian federation announced on Aug. 22 that it chose to disregard the BCAS ruling and keep the original team as named, without van Paesschen. “This decision was taken unanimously, after deliberation by the national jumping commission, which today has come together by emergency,” said the Belgian federation’s statement.
The statement continued that it was not possible for it to comply with the BCAS ruling, since in doing so it would have to remove without justification a horse/rider combination named to the team. “The [Belgian federation] makes this decision in the interests of the sport and with a view to complying with the commitments entered into with the riders [on] the selected team,” the statement read.
Constant van Paesschen is the son of Stanny van Paesschen, who represented Belgium in three Olympic Games and a World Equestrian Games and also coached the Saudi Arabian team. Constant won the Belgian Young Rider championship in 2011.
The Belgian Equestrian Federation will send the team that they had originally selected for Normandy. The Official team is composed of; Pieter Devos (Dream of India Greenfield), Gregory Wathelet (Conrad de Hus) , Jos Lansink (Ensor Litrange LXII), Olivier Philippaerts (Cabrio van de Heffinck) and Jos Verlooy (Domino) as reserve. The deadline for definitive entries for the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games was yesterday.
Source: Equibel/Equnews