February 10, 2008	Sunday	Safar 02,1429

LAHORE, Feb 9: President Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) Lt. Gen. (retd.) Syed Arif Hasan, after getting re-elected for a second term of four years on Saturday, claimed that he had achieved the targets which he had set for the first tenure and vowed that the next tenure will bring major achievements for the country.

After the general body retained Arif as president, Abdul Khaliq as secretary and Major (retd.) Afzal Khan as the treasurer, POA Chief said that in the first tenure the focus was on preparing coaches and technical staff besides generating resources and almost all targets have been achieved to his entire satisfaction. “We held a good number of technical courses, besides providing technical and financial assistances to the national sports federations,” Arif said.

“In the second tenure we will lay emphasis on the grooming of juniors who have recently earned some remarkable achievements,” the president said.

However, Arif candidly admitted that he does not have much hope from the national athletes in the forthcoming Beijing Olympics.

Pakistan only aim for some wild card entries in a few games as most players have failed to qualify for any of the disciplines. The Beijing Olympics are to be held in August this year.

Though in the past, the country had not claimed big haul of medals at the Olympics or Asian levels, there were still some significant achievements in hockey, boxing, rowing till the year 2000. But since then, it has been a pathetic show from the national athletes in the mega event.

The president admitted that there was a decline in sporting standards in the country and added that the world was going ahead with modern technology but Pakistan were a long way away in matching them.

Asked why the POA had conducted the elections one month before the schedule time of March 10, the president said there was no constitutional restriction in this regard.

He dispelled the impression that the general elections in the country, scheduled for Feb 18, had any link with the decision of holding the elections before the scheduled time.

The POA secretary Khaliq reminded that last elections were also held in March 2004, some three months before the scheduled time of June.

In 2004 also, the POA had forced an early elections. It was then president Syed Wajid Ali Shah and secretary Lateef Butt who had announced the polls three months before the scheduled time because Gen Arif (then a serving general) had shown the intentions of contesting the POA post.

But later Lateef had to resign due to health problems and many believe that that he could not maintain working relations with Arif.

To a question, Arif admitted that a certain clause of the national sports policy restricted the president, secretary and the treasurer from contesting the elections for a third term. “But after holding meetings with President Musharraf and and the federal cabinet, we got the approval that a third term could be contested by the sports federations if the officials are doing their jobs diligently,” he said.

When asked to produce the written approval of the same, Arif said it was not yet notified in writing by the authorities. He disclosed that a medical commission had been formed to check injury to players and to give them useful advise on how to prevent them.

Meanwhile, the general body also elected seven vice-presidents and eight associate secretaries in Saturday polls.

New office-bearers:

President: Lt. Gen. (retd.) Syed Arif Hasan.

Vice-presidents: Syed Shahid Ali, Khawaja Farooq Saeed, Chaudhary Mohammad Yaqoob, Brig. Saleem Nawaz, Brig. Najam-us-Saqib, Mrs Fatima Lakhani, Syed Aaqil Shah.

Secretary: Abdul Khaliq Khan.

Treasurer: Major (retd.) Afzal Khan.

Associate secretaries: Col. Yahyha, Khalid Mahmood, Idrees Haider Khawaja, Syed Azhar Ali Shah, Ahmad Ali Rajput, Afzal Awan, Mrs Veena Masud, Tania Malik.