A specialized interdistrict administrative court in Petropavlovsk has ruled that the refusal to pay a monetary bonus to the coach of an athlete who won third place at the Kettlebell World Championships in China was unlawful, infohub.kz reports.

According to the official Telegram channel of the courts of the North Kazakhstan Region, the court heard an administrative case brought by a kettlebell coach against the Ministry of Tourism and Sports of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Committee for Sports and Physical Culture of the Ministry of Tourism and Sports of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

The dispute arose from the refusal to pay a monetary bonus to the coach in his capacity as the athlete's personal coach. The athlete took third place at the 2025 Kettlebell World Championships in the city of Haining, China.

Initially, the coach received a monetary bonus as the first coach, but was denied payment as the personal coach. Disagreeing with that decision, he filed a complaint with the Ministry of Tourism and Sports of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Following its review, the ministry also refused the payment.

The coach then turned to the court.

The court found that the plaintiff had trained the athlete since 2022. These circumstances were confirmed by orders from the sports school, training logbooks, a response from the sports school, and the athlete's individual training plan.

The court noted that under the law, the criterion for recognizing a coach as personal is a training period of at least three years. Moreover, the athlete's absence from the national team, as well as the failure to submit an individual plan among the documents required by the Rules, cannot serve as grounds for refusing payment.

In addition, the court found violations of the administrative procedure in reviewing the application and complaint, including an improper examination of the case circumstances and a lack of proper reasoning for the refusal of the application by the Kazakhstan National Kettlebell Federation.

Accordingly, the court declared unlawful and overturned the committee's actions in refusing to pay the monetary bonus, as well as the ministry's actions in refusing to satisfy the complaint.

The committee is obliged to reconsider the application for the monetary bonus, taking into account the court's legal position.

The court decision has not yet entered into legal force.