15 April 2005	Friday	05 Rabi-ul-Awwal 1426

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JEDDAH, April 14: Senator Choudhary Zafar Iqbal , Chef de Mission of the Pakistan contingent participating in the first Islamic Games in Saudi Arabia, has expressed disappointment over the poor performance of his athletes. Talking to journalists before leaving for Pakistan on Thursday, he said that officials of different federations, made their claims about their chances on the performance of athletes in the 9th SAF Games in Islamabad. The standard of Islamic countries he said, had improved a lot.

“The SAF Games has no standard and one should not make predictions on its basis.

We have to set the Asian Games as our main target and should start preparing for that,” he said.

“Pakistan has a good status in Islamic world and hectic efforts are required to maintain it,” he said.

However, the senator, who is also the chairman of the senate standing committee on sports which had probed into the defeat of the national cricket team against India last year and the pathetic performance of Pakistan Hockey Federation, however, has no plans to initiate any probe into the same dismal performance of athletes in the Islamic Games.

“I will instruct the officials who are the part of the contingent to give their detailed reports, then we will sit together to determine the reasons for the setback and submit a report to the prime minister”, he said.

Pakistan participated in 10 disciplines but except for tennis and volleyball it has failed so far to earn any notable success.

The other games are athletics, handball, basketball, taekwondo, swimming, football, table tennis and karate.

He admitted that Pakistani players lacked international exposure.

“Our tennis players and volleyball team have international exposure and to me that was the main factor behind their success”.

He said that Pakistan the Sports Board (PSB) had made an offer to the football federation to send the national team to Dubai for training before taking part in the Islamic Games.

The board was ready to bear the expenditures, except for air tickets, but the federation could not arrange money for the ticket, he said.

Asked why he was returning back to Pakistan while the games were still on, the senator said that he had an important meeting of the Senate on sports and culture standing committee on April 16.

He said that the national sports federations were not getting sufficient funds to run their affairs but he called for a comprehensive programme, for not only providing the funds to the federations but also have a system of accountability those who failed to perform.