Members of JJIF and UAEJJ meeting in Abu Dhabi. Looking forward to a great cooperation in Asia.

A few weeks ago we published an article about the IBJJF being just a for-profit company with no physical address and not being a recognized sports federation, and about accusations of corruption. The way IBJJF works means that we’ll never get a chance to see BJJ one day in the Olympics. Well it seems that Abu Dhabi’s UAEJJ Federation (Which organizes the World Pro) has teamed up with The Ju-Jitsu International Federation (JJIF which is the internationally recognized federation for sports Ju Jitsu) in the goal to work towards bringing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to the Olympic games.

UAEJJ and JJIF have met this weekend in Abu Dhabi and have laid out an action plan. They will start the drive towards the ultimate dream of including Jiu Jitsu in the Summer Olympic Games, starting with Asia and the Asian Games. Source: Alittihad.ae

MMA/BJJ journalist Mohammed Al Hosani from UAE was part of the dicussion and announced the deal on his Facebook:

It is official: The International Ju-Jitsu Federation incorporates Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu into its Federation.  IBJJF is a private organization. This will be the public version. Their goal is to take the sport where it hasn’t gone before. Namely, the Olympics.

Al Hosani further commented on the impact of this deal on the worlwide BJJ community and how the move will weaken the IBJJF if they succeed in bringing Jiu-Jitsu to the Olympics:

Just talked to an influential member of the BJJ community and he told me this comes as no surprise as the International Ju-Jitsu Federation have been trying to do this for a while now but the IBJJF never budged. They used the Olympics as their drawing card to lure in the BJJ community but their attempts failed up until now.

They now have the most influential National Jiu-Jitsu  Federation (UAEJJ)in the world on their side. Intriguing. What’s next? More to come after tomorrow’s monumental meeting in Etihad Towers in Abu Dhabi.

They will not call our sport ‘Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu’ but just ‘Jiu-Jitsu’ with a different spelling from their ‘Sport Ju Jitsu’. UAEJJ’s goal is to bring Jiu-Jitsu to the Olympics but they need to have a internationally respected and recognized partner such as the JJIF to push this project through. They DO NOT want to work with IBJJF for obvious reasons.

Let’s wait and see if they succeed. In our opinion the fact that IBJJF is just a for-profit company and is not recognized, greatly affects BJJ’s growth and acceptance in the sporting world.

About the JJIF:

JJIF is an international sport federation founded in 1998 after the expansion of the European Ju-Jitsu Federation (EJJF) for the propagation of the modern competitive sports version of Jujitsu, also known as Sport Ju-Jitsu.

As a member of the General Association of International Sport Federations (GAISF) and the International World Games Association (IWGA), the JJIF represents Sports Ju-Jitsu worldwide. The JJIF is currently the only Jujutsu/Ju-Jitsu organization recognized by the GAISF and IWGA; Ju-Jitsu under JJIF rules is a part of the World Games.

A few years ago the JJIF added Ne-Waza to its federation. The ne-waza-system is the newest of the official competition-systems and is similar to BJJ. The ne-waza-fight starts in standing position and the competitors try to gain points with several throwing-, take-down-, imobilisation techniques, sweeps (changing from lower to upper position starting with a guard) or to win the fight ultimativly with submission-techniques. If no competitor ended the fight with a submission technique the referee announces the competitor with the most points as winner.