Badminton - Michel Bau heads African badminton governing body |25 May 2018

Chairman of the Seychelles Badminton Association, Michel Bau, is the new president of the Badminton Confederation Africa following his election at the confederation’s general annual meeting held last week in Bangkok, Thailand.

He succeeds the president of the Badminton Federation of Nigeria Danlami Senchi who resigned in January 2018.

During the election, Mr Bau won 68 votes compared to 41 for his only opponent – Amine Zoubiri who has been holding the fort since January 2018 when he was chosen as acting president in an extraordinary general meeting held in Pretoria, South Africa after Mr Senchi stepped down to avoid a vote of no confidence.

It is important to note that Ghana’s badminton president, Yeboah Evans, withdrew his nomination as a candidate for the post, just to back up Mr Bau to become the new president of the Badminton Confederation Africa (BCA). 

"I am enthused by the delegates’ responses to our message of a better BCA agenda and will support Mr Michel Bau from Seychelles to win the ultimate leadership role,” Mr Evans said prior to the election.

He further stated that after thorough deliberation and reflection with different involved parties and stakeholders, the Ghanaian team decided to withdraw his candidacy and his camp joined forces with presidential candidate Michel Bau from Seychelles.

With the new appointment, Mr Bau is now automatically an executive member of the sport’s international governing body, the Badminton World Federation (BWF). He is the new continental representative for Africa.

After 17 years spent on the BCA as a council member, Mr Bau told Sports NATION yesterday he “will remain impartial and deliver his duties with honesty and transparency”.

He, however, noted that he “will remain committed to the Seychelles Badminton Association” and will use his influence as much as possible to push it forward, especially in sponsorship discussion.

He will hold the post until 2021 when there will be fresh election.

Mr Bau, who has been the Seychelles Badminton Association chairman for almost 24 years now, is also a member of the Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association (Socga) since 2001 and is serving his fifth mandate.

The BCA (formerly known as Badminton Confederation of Africa) is the governing body of badminton in Africa.

It is one of the five continental bodies under the flag of the BWF and it now has 39 member countries.

The BCA is geographically divided into four regions with each one under the responsibility of a vice-president.

As for the operation of BCA activities the member associations are grouped in four regions which are region one (Northern part of Africa - Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Mauritania, St Helena, Sudan and Tunisia), region two (Western part of Africa - Benin, Cameroon, Central Africa, Rep, Congo, DRC Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Ghana, Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Togo), region three (Southern part of Africa - Botswana, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe) and region four, (Eastern part of Africa - Burundi, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Mauritius, Seychelles, Somalia, Tanzania and Uganda).

For development purposes, the BCA members are grouped into four categories which are developed countries (Algeria, Egypt, Mauritius, Morocco, Nigeria, Seychelles and South Africa), developing  countries (Benin, Botswana, Congo, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya, Namibia, Togo, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe), less developed countries (Burundi, Central Africa Republic, DRC Congo, Eritrea, Equatorial Guinea, Ivory Coast, Lesotho, Madagascar, Malawi, Mauritania, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania and Tunisia) and dormant countries (Somalia and St Helena).

R. D.