The Asia Oceania Zone of IWBF held their Congress Sunday November 6 and among other things elected a new executive. With current President Yuichi Watanabe retiring it meant a new president would be elected.

The new executive is made up of:

President In-Duk Kang, Korea

Treasurer Rae Soo Kim, Korea

Technical Officer Kaneyoshi Sugiyama, Japan

Classification Officer Toufic Allouche, Lebanon

In addition the following were elected Vice-Presidents of the five regions in the Zone

Vice-president East Asia Region Toshihiko, Japan

Vice-President West Asia Region Omar Hindawi, Jordan

Vice-president South East Asia Ang Kean Koo, Malaysia

Vice-president Oceania Dave MacCalman, New Zealand

The election for the Vice-president Central Region will take place at a later time.

The new Executive Council members will appoint the Secretary General at their first meeting.

IWBF President Maureen Orchard spoke to the Congress on the importance of creating more possibilities for athletes to compete. She mentioned that this would create more opportunities to hold courses to train referees and classifiers. She urged the regions to become much more active in organizing tournaments and training opportunities. She reminded the delegates that it is the primary responsibility for the nations and the zone to create development opportunities. Mrs. Orchard thanked outgoing President Yuichi Watanabe for his contribution to the Zone over the last years.

The Congress accepted the reports presented by the current Executive Members and approved the Treasurer’s report. The Congress directed the Executive to prepare a plan that would have each Region host a competition in 2012 which would serve as pre-qualifications for the Asia Oceania Qualification Tournament for the 2014 World Championships.

Incoming President Kang addressed the delegates and thanked them for the trust they had placed in him. He promised to work closely with them to improve the number of countries playing wheelchair basketball in Asia Oceania.

Mrs. Orchard took the opportunity of the meeting to present Greg Love, Secretary General of the Zone with the Gold Medal Triad Award, IWBF’s top award. Greg has been involved with IWBF since 1985 in various capacities including Vice-President of IWBF, but most notably as a referee, referee trainer and referee supervisor. Greg had the honor of officiating in 3 Gold medal games for IWBF over his long career.

At the end of the meeting the participants were taken to the brand new gymnasium to watch the teams perform, where they were treated to several very close games.