A National Assembly panel was informed on Tuesday that Lt Gen Syed Arif Hassan (retd) has been elected as the president of Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) for the fifth term despite the fact that Pakistan has not won a single medal in the Olympics Games during his previous four terms of 16 years.
The meeting of the Standing Committee on Inter-Provincial Coordination (IPC), which was held at Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) with MNA Agha Hassan Baloch in the chair, expressed concerns over the state of affairs in POA and the declining of various games.
Briefing the committee, the high officials of the IPC told the committee that the main office-bearers are allowed a maximum of two tenures in any office of the federation or association after which they will become ineligible for holding the same post. However, they will be allowed to contest for next higher post at any time. They said that on completion of his two tenures as per National Sport Policy, the president of POA in alleged connivance with National Sports Federations including Pakistan Cycling, Gymnastics, Handball and Volleyball Federations had challenged the tenure restriction clauses in Lahore High Court and the same were allowed vide judgment dated October 28, 2010.
However, the officials said the PSB challenged the LHC judgement in the Supreme Court by filing the appeal which was allowed and thereby the sports policy was upheld in 2012.
They said that the POA is of the opinion that it is not affiliated with PSB and for the reason the sports policy is not applicable to it. They further maintained that electoral-college of POA has been altered and 119 members have been added to ensure the victory of present office-bearers of the POA.
The IPC officials further maintained that Pakistan has not been able to win a single medal in the Olympic Games in the previous four tenures of 16 years of the incumbent POA president.
They said that the recent elections of the POA have been challenged in the LHC through a writ petition and a decision on this is pending with the court.
The committee also appreciated the performance of Pakistani athletes for wining 33 gold, 41 silver and 60 brown medals in South Asian Games held in Kathmandu, Nepal, during the current month.
The committee pointed out that Pakistani athletes have immense potential of talent and directed the Ministry of IPC to provide them proper platform of sports so that they could win more medals in Olympics and other international sports events.
The panel also supported the idea for organizing National Games in Balochistan to promote the sports activities all over the country and directed the IPC to organize sports events for special children, especially deaf and dumb as well so that they could be able to compete internationally. The committee appreciated the National Internship Program (NIP) and directed the Ministry of IPC to arrange awareness programs at district level, especially in rural and far-flung areas of Pakistan, so that students of those areas where the services of internet are not available could also be benefited.
The meeting was attended by MNAs Gul Dad Khan, Mehboob Shah, Chaudhry Zulfiqar Ali Bhinder, Gul Zafar Khan, Munawara Bibi, Nasiba Chana, Shaheen Naz Saifullah and Mohammad Anwar, and officials of the Ministry of IPC and its attached departments.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2019
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