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Coronavirus has started wreaking havoc all over the world and its effects can be felt in the gaming and tech industry alike. After the postponement earlier of a CS:GO, Overwatch, PUBG and a League of Legends tournament in China, the fears have crossed the Ural mountains and into Europe. ESL has been directed to hold IEM Katowice without an audience.
Due to the dynamic changes in the global health situation, the Gouverneur of Silesian Jarosław Wieczorek issued a decision to remove their approval regarding ESL hosting a mass event in Katowice, Poland. #IEM https://t.co/hak1sn98o7
— Intel®ExtremeMasters (@IEM) February 27, 2020
The order comes from the Silesian Governor. This is despite the fact that Poland hasn’t yet reported any case of Coronavirus. Nevertheless, UK has reported 16 cases of Coronavirus and Italy has reported over 400 cases of Coronavirus (according to BBC). Following the governor’s orders, ESL has announced that they will be reaching out to all the guests and media and will be refunding all the tickets. They also mentioned that they were repeatedly told that the event would be allowed to take place, the last reconfirmation being given to them “several hours ago” before the announcement. Here is their full statement:
At 19:45 CET we were informed by the Silesian Voivodeship that our mass event license for IEM Katowice was revoked. Until that moment we had a legally binding decision allowing us to organize the event, which was reconfirmed multiple times over the last few days. The last time the decision was confirmed was several hours ago. The Governor of Silesian (Silesian Voivode) Jarosław Wieczorek issued a decision to remove their approval regarding ESL hosting a mass event in Katowice, Poland. Due to this development, Intel Extreme Masters Katowice 2020 will not have any audience on-site. This means both Spodek-Arena audience as well as IEM Expo.
ESL respects this decision from the local authorities and is currently working on reaching out to all ticket holders, guests, and media. Tickets will be fully refunded. The tournament will be conducted and broadcasted as planned, but without any additional visitors on-site. We are deeply sorry for all fans and players.