Olympic Games Opening Ceremony

[Mrsspagnoli57]

Why, when the Games are in London, are the announcements being made in FRENCH first and ENGLISH second?

[Hopkirk]

French is the official language of the Olympic organisation.

It always is used first at the Olympics - even in Beijing.

[Ann]

Thanks we now know the reason, but it was still very irritating and perhaps should have been announced beforehand that this was going to happen as EVERYONE is asking, the papers will be full of it tomorrow, you see!

[MarkRae]

How can anyone now know this...?

[TheNovice]

I knew Mark......sheltered life I guess!!!!!

[kawakiri]

Most are too busy whinging to take things in.

[sunny-dave]

Merde ...

[ABerrant]

Absolute rubbish that French is always used first. English and French are both official languages of the IOC with no nominal order of preference. Common sense dictated that the host language would determine if French or English should play the primary role.

This current sorry state of affairs is a reaction to French having been seen to be overshadowed by English during previous Games and so, because of lobbying by Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), it was made a condition of London 2012 that French would take precedence.

http://www.telegraph....e-held-in-French.html

http://www.livemint.c...second-fiddl.html?d=1

[Ann]

Well they kept that jolly quiet didn't they? I think if we had known, there would have been an outcry! The papers will be full of this tomorrow you wait!

[scowie]

The french announcement coming first is a non-issue. It's not like that makes it the primary language or anything. It makes sense for the french bit to be said first because if the english came first, the english crowds would start cheering after some of the english announcements making the following french ones barely audible.

[bluemoon1]

Surely they should be spoken in Greek first.