AFC President Mohamed Bin Hammam.

 
 
    








Mohamed Bin Hammam

On the 6th January, 2011 addressed the 24th AFC Congress in the capital Qatar and also his home city of Doha. Incidentally, the current President of FIFA Sepp Blatter (who Bin Hammam is challenging for the FIFA Presidency role), was present as well.

I would like to share with you ALL the AFC President's speech at the CONGRESS.

WELCOME

Happy New Year and I hope all of us will find the year 2011 more prosperous, healthier and more successful.

Dear Presidents, delegates of AFC Member Associations and guests;

Dear President of FIFA, Mr. Joseph Sepp Blatter;

My dear colleagues from the Confederations:
• From CAF, President Issa Hayatou
• From UEFA, First Vice President, Mr. Senes Erzik

Dear Dr. Chung Mong Joon, FIFA Vice President;

Dear Executive Committee of AFC and General Secretary of FIFA,

Dear commercial partners, led by Mr. Seamus O’Brien, Chairman of World Sport Group;

Dear friends from the media;

It is my privilege and honour as the President of AFC to welcome you to the 24th AFC Congress in my home city, Doha.

CONGRATULATORY MESSAGES: 2022 FIFA WORLD CUP

My dear family,

We are meeting today at the back of what is the most successful year on and off the pitch for Asian football.

When we met last in South Africa, this Congress called upon the support of our colleagues in the FIFA Executive Committee to bring the FIFA World Cup back to Asia.

On your behalf and on behalf of all the football fans in Asia, I would like to thank them for their show of unity and solidarity in making it possible for Asia again to host the World Cup. I would like to extend our congratulations to Qatar, Qatar Football Association and Qatar’s bidding team for succeeding to win the hosting of the World Cup 2022.

TERM AS PRESIDENT

Ladies and Gentlemen,

My strong belief in the passion for football in Asia and the potential of Asian football made me announce my desire to lead this Confederation more than eight years ago.

Asia with its huge population has the most talents, and I believed that the world has yet to feel the vibration of Asian football.

I dreamed, like most of you, that Asia would one day stand tall in the world of international football; and that Asian teams, with their Asian players, coaches and administrators would hold their own and challenge for dominance in world football.

In August 2002, this Congress gave me the wonderful opportunity to be in the driving seat, to work on these beliefs and to start my wonderful journey of bringing our dreams to reality.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Congress for your trust in me then and now again, as I move into the last term of this presidency.

These eight years have passed in a flash, yet the difference in Asian football between before and now could not have been greater.

During this time, together, we have managed to change the face and future of football in our beloved continent, Asia. I believe that we did not leave any stone unturned in our efforts to raise the name of Asia higher and higher.

As a result, AFC and Asian football is slowly but surely, making itself a leading confederation in international football.

In 2002, we faced a paradox: our continent was rich and we had the most raw talents, and we still do, but yet our football lived in poverty and was the most underdeveloped in the world.

In order to develop, we needed a strong foundation and base.

VISION ASIA

As I began office as the AFC President, I launched the Vision Asia project - the Confederation’s blue print for the future development of football in Asia.

Under this vision, I have initiated a number of projects.

1. AFC STATUTES’ PROJECT

2. AMATEUR FOOTBALL DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

3. FESTIVAL OF FOOTBALL PROJECT

4. PROJECT FUTURE

5. ELITE EDUCATIONAL PROJECT

6. COMPETITIONS’ DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

7. PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL PROJECT

8. WOMEN’S FOOTBALL PROJECT

9. FUTSAL DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

10. SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY PROJECT

I will summarise some of those projects.

1. VISION ASIA STATUTES PROJECT

We did not need a tailor made statutes which protects and serves the personal interest of individuals or any particular parties.

I believed that our development and achievements in the future must be grounded in a Statutes ….
• That will protect our sovereignty;
• That ensures transparent, accountable and democratic governance; and one
• That is inclusive and guarantees the rotation of power among the football family stakeholders.

We wanted a statutes…
• That will let us face the challenges of tomorrow;
• That will set the parameters to unleash the potentials in Asia; and one that will make us a leading and global player of international football.

Since the assumption of my office 8 years ago, through the support of this Congress, I have taken several revolutionary measures in keeping with this commitment. Let me recall some of these:
• Ensuring a fair representatives of all our family in the Executive Committee and Standing Committees by introducing the zoning system
• Introduction of women’s committee members, including a Vice President on our Executive Committee
• Age limit for our Executive Committee members
• Term limit for its President

Today we continue this journey with more fine-tuning to our Statutes and I call upon this Congress to support these amendments which will guarantee that democratic norms and principles always prevail in AFC’s acts and dealings.

While the statutes govern our conduct, ethics and lays the foundation of our work, the Confederation also needed a consolidated football development programme.
2. VISION ASIA: AMATEUR FOOTBALL DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

The base of football is amateurism. More than 99% of our football is played at the amateur level. If we ignore this base, we will fail in our duties and we would not succeed.

Since the first city league was launched in 2005, we are now working in 38 cities in Asia in 9 different countries…
• We have created and empowered 38 City Football Associations in these cities;
• And while the game used to be played randomly in these cities by ad-hoc teams and groups of players, we gave life to more than 300 structured amateur football clubs;

• We created home and away amateur city leagues not only as first division but also we have gone to second and even third division amateur leagues in some of these cities;
• Additionally we have established school competitions with a league format with participation of more than 1,200 schools;

• And thousands of coaches, referees, instructors who have graduated from our programmes are able to practice and sharpen their skills every day and every week through the platforms provided by Vision Asia.

3. FESTIVAL OF FOOTBALL PROJECT

This Congress will remember that Asia was infected with the over-aged players’ disease – a disease which has affected our youth development in Asia and cost you huge amounts of money and resulted in you losing lots of time and effort.

I am happy to share with this Congress that for the first time, we have witnessed in the year 2010, zero over-aged players participating in our youth competitions and this is thanks to the creation of the festivals of football project.

I would like to congratulate all of Asia over this result.

Now we can be sure that Asian teams in the future will be the result of comprehensive development programmes put together by the Member Associations and that our competitions will no longer witness any cheating in age.

4. VISION ASIA: PROJECT FUTURE

5. VISION ASIA: ELITE EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME

6. VISION ASIA: COMPETITIONS’ DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

7. VISION ASIA: PROFESSIONALISATION PROJECT

After setting the base and structure for amateur and semi-professional football, AFC took, in 2006, the first steps in structuring our professional football.

We initiated the AFC Champions League as a Club Professional Football project – a project aimed to be comparable to the best European Leagues, an ambitious but also very achievable and necessary scheme that underpins professionalism in Asian football.

The impacts of professionalization are not only limited to the elite level of our club competition, but also for the national team competitions.

Thanks to the 36 broadcasters, for the first time in AFC’s history, the AFC Asian Cup will be covered and watched in all the continents of the world.

I am convinced that you will witness for yourself new benchmarks and standards during the AFC Asian Cup 2011 in Doha, both in terms of organization and on-pitch action.

8. VISION ASIA: WOMEN’S FOOTBALL PROJECT

9. VISION ASIA: FUTSAL DEVELOPMENT PROJECT

10. VISION ASIA: SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY PROJECT

Ladies and Gentlemen, we have based AFC’s activities on three pillars: development of the game; and organization of competitions and lately, we introduced the Social Responsibility activities.

Football is the most popular sport in our continent and we need to leverage the power of our beautiful game.

Football has a power that goes beyond the field of play and we have witnessed this phenomenon first hand through our many projects under Social Responsibility.

We have extended help and contributed to the rebuilding of societies in Pakistan, China, and Myanmar to name a few who have been hit by natural disasters.

We have launched last October the Midnight Football project. Under the theme, “Off the Street, On the Ball”, we have taken unguided kids off the street and back to schools and their families through football.

Last week in Doha, we launched the Dream Asia School Challenge aimed at fostering interaction between communities with different races, cultures, religions, nationalities and languages.

We have also signed partnership agreements with United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) in the fight against global hunger and yesterday, you witnessed the signing with the Reach Out To Asia (ROTA), a charity initiative aimed at promoting education for all.

In addition to all the above, 1% of AFC’s revenue is now guaranteed and channeled to social programmes that allow people to explore their dreams through football and to make social responsibility a lifelong practice that is developed and continued.

THE FUTURE

Ladies and Gentlemen, as you can see, the last eight (8) years have been a busy one as we lay the foundation for our future.

As we look to the future, we -- you and I -- must avoid the desire to live on a day to day, week to week and year to year basis or rest on our past achievements.

We all have to realize that the challenges ahead of us are numerous.

In the next four years, the injection of more quality into all our initiated projects will continue. However, specifically, my priority will lie on the following areas:

First and foremost, I vow that through our rules and regulations, AFC will fully protect the sovereignty of itself and our Member Associations.

While we welcome co-operations from the governments and other third party bodies, we should not allow outsiders to dictate to us what they want and we will not let them interfere in our business.

Your decisions as Member Associations should not be overruled or influenced by third parties as are in some cases today.

Secondly, while I will continue to expand the base of football participation, my other priority in the coming term is to continue the push to professionalise our football.

Ladies and gentlemen, while Asia has not yet taken over the world, the rumblings of Asia can now be felt. We strongly believe that the Future is Asia and we are working very hard towards the future.

We must push our limits and challenge the status quo.

Conclusion

This Congress has entrusted me with the honour to lead Asian football for the coming 4 years. It is a responsibility which I will not shirk from and I call upon the congress to not shirk from their responsibilities also.

In this congress, you have the responsibility to choose your Executive Committee for the coming 4 years.

I strongly believe in competition, and election is a type of the competition. However, let this competition be a fair one and let us vow to keep the competition among our football family.

To all the voters of this Congress, on behalf of the candidates, I call on you ….
• to vote with your conscience; and
• to vote for Asia, And not for the individuals.

If we dream of international football and if we want to stand amongst the giants of the world, we must not keep our best candidates out of our decision making body.

And to all the candidates who are standing today, on behalf of the Congress, I call on you…

To ask not what Asian football can do for you but what can you do for Asian football so that our dreams of being at the pinnacle of international football would succeed.

My dear voters and candidates, it is not about us, it is about Asia. It is about the hopes and dreams of hundreds and millions of fans and footballers across the continent.

My dear family, God bless you and God bless Asia.

The Future is Asia. Thank you very much and have a good day.

Back in April 2009, Wednesday the 15th April to be precise, President Sepp " Blatter urges fair play in election".

LINK: http://tinyurl.com/44ytn2r

As you will read, in his final statement President Blatter said:

"As President of FIFA, it is my duty to remind all members of the Asian football community of the importance of these values in the run-up to the election scheduled for 8 May for the vacant Asian seat on the FIFA Executive Committee and of the requirement to respect FIFA's Statutes, principles and decisions, in accordance with the regulations governing world football".

My question is why would the President of FIFA...back in 2009 WARN the "members of the Asian football community of "FAIRPLAY and ETHICS VALUES"? in the lead-up to the election "scheduled for 8th May, 2009.

http://tinyurl.com/65qy3a7 also http://tinyurl.com/3rtgfr5 and http://tinyurl.com/3zt2el3

Ambassador for Qatar in bid for 2022, FIFA World Cup, CATALAN NATIVE and BARCELONA MANAGER Jocep 'Pep' Guardiola...HE MUST REALLY DESPISE...'SPAIN'.

"QATAR FOUNDATION deal  may have kept Messi at Barcelona but Cruyff believes club has become vulgar!"

I would'nt TRUST these 'GREASY. OILY ASIAN CROOKS' Like other foreign nations THEY ALL HUNGER FOR THE DESIRE TO DOMINATE THE GAME CALLED 'FOOTBALL' even to the extent of BUYING FOOTBALL CLUBS....RECENTLY THE PURCHASE OF A SPANISH CLUB...My personal opinion is that QATAR'S 2022 FIFA World CUP Bid was a 'WROUGHT'.