Chief executive Fergal Carruth has defended the record of the IABA since a disastrous campaign at Rio 2016 and stated the boxing body was "confident to a degree" of satisfying a number of Sport Ireland recommendations before a 1 July deadline.
The IABA and Sport Ireland met on Tuesday, with discussions focused on the autonomy of high-performance director Bernard Dunne, the implementation of a new rule book and the governance of the amateur boxing body.
In a statement released today, Sport Ireland acknowledged progress made by the IABA, while indicating that "significant issues of concern" remained, as does the possible suspension of funding.
Speaking on RTÉ 2fm’s Game On this evening, Carruth told listeners: "The rule book is at an advanced level.
"It’s not completely finished. There are some amendments still to be made."
The IABA now has just over three weeks to have their new rule book completed and accepted by its members.
"To bring it forward now to our membership in the timeline that has been put to us will be a challenge," Carruth admitted.
"But we will be endeavouring to do that in accordance with the timeframes that have been laid out for us by Sport Ireland."
Regarding the prospects of its members giving the new rule book the green light, Carruth said: "We would be confident to a degree.
"There are a lot of people in the mix. We have a huge body of volunteers in the organisation. We’ve over 16,500 members."
Sport Ireland has confirmed it will suspend all funding to the Irish Athletic Boxing Association unless issues sorted #rtesport pic.twitter.com/EqYlXtEqs8
— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) June 7, 2017
One contentious matter which Carruth believes has been resolved, concerns who exactly is the chairman of the IABA.
Joe Christle is recognised by Sport Ireland and Carruth as the rightful chairman, but David O’Brien has received the backing of a number of directors as an alternative chair.
"Sport Ireland acknowledged that Joe Christle is our chairman and we have sought legal advice on the issue. We are very confident that the matter has been put to bed," he said.
Championing the work of the IABA since Rio 2016, where Ireland’s fighters failed to win a medal and had one member of the team fail a drugs test, Carruth said: "We’ve done a huge amount of work since the Olympic Games.
"We’ve endeavoured to learn any lessons from the Games.
"We’ve been very successful in retaining our high performance head coach Zaur Antia. That was really, really important to us.
"We conducted a very intensive post-Rio review a very honest review which went into the workings of the high performance unit."
Carruth also took the opportunity to rubbish suggestions that Dunne has been hindered by the IABA’s hierarchy, hailing his appointment.
"I think that has been the biggest and best piece of work that we have done to date since the Games," the chief executive opined.
"Bernard has been welcomed very much with open arms into the high performance programme and into the association as a whole.
"He’s very popular within boxing. He has a fantastic record in boxing - never being beaten as an amateur.
"Bernard is one of ours and has been welcomed as such."
"The general membership recognise that the organisational structures within the IABA are not fit for purpose"
It emerged on Thursday that IABA President Pat Ryan, one of the directors who voted for O'Brien to take over as chairman, had sent a letter to Christle, claiming that previous calls for reform have not been heeded.
"Joe, you are quite well aware that all is not right in our sport," he wrote.
"You have been put on notice on a number of occasions that the general membership recognise that the organisational structures within the IABA are not fit for purpose.
"Who will suffer in the event that funding will be withdrawn? In excess of 99pc of boxing activity is undertaken by the 360 clubs, 26 County Boards and four Provinces who do not receive a cent of that funding."
