Formula 1 supremo
Bernie Ecclestone may be willing to admit that he is “very ignorant” in certain matters, but it is clear he has no intention of relinquishing his cast-iron grip over the sport for the foreseeable future.
The 77-year-old has ruled the top flight for some three decades now as president and CEO of both
Formula One Management and Formula One Administration, after creating the Formula One Constructors' Association (FOCA) back in 1972. Over the years he has developed a reputation as a man whom it would perilous to cross.
“Me? A bully? At my height?” he protested in a revealing interview with the
Daily Mail. “Well, it's true that small people normally try to compensate by being overbearing. You have to stand up for yourself as a kid in school and that goes on through life.
“Do short men have larger brains? If you are an average hobbit you need to be a little bit smarter to stay alive.
“In the old days it was easier to be dictatorial, but now in Formula 1 we have more of a democracy. I hate democracy as a political system – it stops you getting things done. I think people should have decisions made for them. Torture is just an old-fashioned way of getting things done.
“A good dictator is better for a country than a democracy. Democracy in Britain leads to confusion and bad compromises. In a democracy, the Prime Minister is always influenced by someone or some group or the press. I myself have never voted. What's the point?”
The ‘hobbit' reference came in response to criticism from the residents of the Swiss ski resort of Gstaad, after Ecclestone raised the prices of drinks in the town's Olden Hotel, which he owns, allegedly in an effort to keep out undesirable locals. Going one step further still, the local newspaper likened him to an 18,000-year-old Indonesian hobbit found by anthropologists in 2004.
