Socga’s annual general meeting |27 March 2017

Gopal gets another four-year mandate

The new Socga executive committee:

Front row (from left to right): Kanté, Gopal, Adam, and Banane

Back row (from left to right): Dora, Bau, Dogley and Alcindor

As expected Antonio Gopal has been given another four-year mandate and re-elected president of the local Olympic body – Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association.

This was during Seychelles Olympic and Commonwealth Games Association’s (Socga) annual general meeting at the Eden Bleu hotel on Saturday.

Socga represents both the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF). It was previously known as Seychelles National Olympic Committee (Snoc) until March 2007. Snoc came into existence in 1979 when Seychelles became a member of the IOC.

Compared to 2013 when he won the vote on a 17-6 score against Ronald Wong, Gopal took victory on a 20-3 score on Saturday to win a seventh consecutive four-year mandate as president.

His two challengers were Lucas Georges (3 votes) and Terrence Barbé (0 vote).

“I don’t see my re-election as a victory against the other candidates, but rather that the federations wanted me to continue working for sports in Seychelles,” said Mr Gopal.

He added: “I love sports. If I had decided to stop my affiliation with Socga or I was not re-elected Socga president this does not mean that I would have distanced myself from sports. Sports run in my veins and as long as I feel I have the strength to make any contribution I will continue to do so.”

On Socga’s plan for the next four years, Mr Gopal added that Socga has worked in liaison with the IOC on the 2020 plan which has already been approved. The same has been done with the CGF and at the same time, Socga has been looking for help from these two international bodies in relation to the Games that will be coming up.

Socga president Gopal added that the assembly has made it clear that they want sports to develop to reach the next level, especially through financial help.

“I can say that sport is developing in Seychelles, but at a slow pace. Socga on its own cannot push for a more rapid development in sports here. We need to work with the federations, the National Sports Council, the ministry responsible for sports to increase the contributions, not only, towards federations.

“We need to have a goal and work on achieving it. We all want to win an Olympic medal, but we need to work hard and commit ourselves to achieving it. We are among the top-10 African nations in sports, but we can improve to be in the top-five and also be among the top-three in the Indian Ocean Island Games. Again we have to make commitments and set out targets. I am not saying that the government should give money for all the projects, but it is only after setting out our goals that we will choose which ones are of priority and we will work together to achieve them, said Mr Gopal who was first elected president in 1992 after serving as an ordinary member on the first Snoc executive committee from 1979 to 1982 and as secretary general on the second from 1982 to 1991.

The other committee members

Unchallenged, Hughes Adam has also been re-elected vice-president for the fifth time after getting 19 votes. He first took office in 1997 and was re-elected as vice-president in 2001, 2005, 2009, 2013 and 2017.

Like Mr Adam, Alain Alcindor was unchallenged for the post of secretary general and he amassed 15 votes for a fourth mandate ‒ 2005, 2009, 2013 and 2017 ‒ after joining the local Olympic body as an ordinary member in 1994.

Treasurer Mary Banane was also re-elected in office with 19 votes for a third mandate. She was first elected into the post in 2009 after taking over from Ivan Roberts, who resigned in September 2007.

Nine candidates vied for the four ordinary member posts on the executive committee which were taken by Selby Dora (16 votes), Michel Bau (15 votes), Norbert Dogley (10 votes) and Fatime Kanté (9 votes). They will be joined by the athletes’ commission representative.

The other candidates were Terrence Barbé (5 votes), Donald Célestine (6 votes), Lucas Georges (6 votes), Tracey Hétimier (6 votes) and Jeffrey Lagrenade (8 votes).

Célestine and Hétimier served on the previous executive committee but have lost their seats.

Mr Bau was first elected into office in 2001 and is serving his fifth mandate. As for Mr Dora, who joined the executive committee in 2003 after Jocelyn Humphrey resigned, he has been re-elected for a fourth time after 2005, 2009 and 2013. Mr Dogley is making a comeback on the committee after losing out in 2009.

Sports federations and associations nominated candidates, who were then elected by secret ballot to serve on Socga’s executive committee.

Although they are not members of any federation or association, candidates had to be nominated by sporting federations and associations who are members of Socga.

Representatives of the athletes’ commission and the 22 associations and federations affiliated to Socga were allowed to vote during the elections.

The 22 sports federations and associations are track and field athletics, boxing, basketball, badminton, volleyball, football, table tennis, tennis, swimming, judo, karate, handball, hockey, petanque, canoeing, chess, cycling, squash, gymnastics, weightlifting, yachting and netball.

The athletes’ commission and all the 22 associations and federations have one vote.

Also during the meeting, the Seychelles Athletics Federation won the best federation trophy which was presented by Mrs Banane to SAF secretary general Wilfred Adrien, while the sport of golf was accepted as member of Socga.

A number of other points were raised during the meeting and Sports NATION will come back on those in another issue.

G. G.