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Ex-middleweight world titleholder Gennady Golovkin is slated to be chosen as the head of World Boxing and guide boxing as it heads toward the 2028 Olympic Games in LA.

Golovkin, who earned a silver medal in the 2004 Athens Games and achieved the most world title defences in the history of the middleweight division, is the sole nominee for president endorsed by the sport’s independent vetting panel for Sunday’s election. As a result, he will assume leadership of World Boxing, which was established as the authority for amateur Olympic boxing this year.

That role used to be held by the former international boxing body, but it was expelled by the IOC in 2023 following a string of judging, corruption and governance scandals.

In his platform, the boxing veteran, whose initial term runs until 2027, promised to rebuild confidence in the sport and ensure boxing’s future in the Olympic programme, beginning at the 2028 LA Olympics.

“As an amateur, I earned with pride a second-place finish at the Olympic Games Athens 2004, symbolizing Kazakhstan but the values of fair play and discipline that characterize the sport,” he wrote. “As a professional, I won numerous world titles, recognized for my honesty, sportsmanship, and dedication to fair play.

“I am committed to strengthening governance, guaranteeing open finances, developing technology to ensure impartial scoring, and expanding opportunities for athletes of all genders in every region of the world.”

The International Olympic Committee organized the boxing tournaments itself at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 and the 2024 Paris Olympics. However, after last year’s Olympics were overshadowed by disputes about gender eligibility, it declared a need for a new partner in time for the 2028 Olympics.

In the month of February, it officially recognized World Boxing, which then ran the 2025 world championships in Liverpool. For that event, the organization implemented compulsory gender verification, to assess qualification of male and female athletes, a move that the Olympic committee is also evaluating for the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.