Interim committee disaffiliates sports federations

Decision made as officials attended meeting called by banned POA chief.

KARACHI: The interim committee, backed by the government, the Pakistan Sports Board (PSB) and the Inter Provincial Coordination (IPC), has disaffiliated more than a dozen sports federations and suspended several officials for five years for attending the meeting called by already banned Pakistan Olympic Association (POA) chief Arif Hasan.

The interim committee had warned officials not to attend the meeting as they deemed it illegal after Hasan and POA secretary Khalid Mehmood were suspended for life, but the meeting was still conducted.

In response, the interim committee sent a letter to the PSB and IPC informing them about the suspension.



The letter – sent by interim committee chairman Asif Bajwa to PSB director Amir Hamza Gillani – read,  “In pursuance of the decisions taken in the General Council Meeting held on June 8, following National Sports Federations (NSFs) and officials who attended an illegal meeting called by Lt Gen (retd) Syed Arif Hasan being without any lawful authority, the NSFs stand disaffiliated from the General Council of POA and the individuals who represented such federations are banned.”

The federations which have been disaffiliated include baseball, handball, ju-jitsu, karate, rowing, rugby, swimming, softball, taekwondo, volleyball, weightlifting, wushu and the Punjab Olympic Association (PbOA).

The letter further read, “In view of the above, you are requested to kindly stop all facilitation like financial grants, issuance of NOC, organization of training camps, sponsoring of competitions at any level and use of Pakistan Sports Complex for any purpose.”

Officials banned for five years

Some of the officials who were sanctioned include Zafar Gujjar (kabaddi), Fawzi Khawaja (rugby) and Chaudry Mohammad Yaqoob (volleyball).

Meanwhile, the officials who were running parallel federations and attended the meeting have also been banned. The list includes Doda Khan (boxing), Idrees Haider Khwaja (cycling), Painda Malik and Ahmed Ali Rajput (gymnastics), Sibtain Rizvi and Hafizullah (table tennis) and Ahmed Ali Rajput (Sindh Olympic Association).

However, an interim committee official stressed that the athletes had nothing to worry about with regards to the ongoing saga. Once the elections of the POA are conducted next month, he said, they will be able to participate in important events.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 14^th, 2013.