Major General Dahlan Jumaan Al Hamad offered his deepest thanks and appreciation to HH Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, Amir of Qatar, for his great support and generous patronage of sport and athletes, which always yields great successes for Qatar in sport. Al Hamad, president of the Asian and Qatari athletics federations and IAAF vice-president, said his unanimous election as president of the Asian Athletics Association would not have been possible without the great support of our wise leadership, which had convinced many that the next stage for Asian athletics would see great successes driven by Qatari sporting thinking. He said this win represented a major boost for him ahead of the IAAF elections for the vice-presidency next August in China.
Major General Dahlan expressed his immense happiness at being unanimously elected president of the Asian Athletics Association, saying the support of our wise leadership had given him great strength given Qatar’s great interest in sport and achieving success in it, noting at the same time that he carried Qatari thinking to develop athletics in Asia and was aware that Qatar knows nothing but success, and that his post would therefore be an honour for Qatari thinking in developing sport at continental level. He affirmed he would continue the major work he had begun over the past two years for further success in Asian athletics, which relies heavily on the Qatari vision for development to be better now and in future, noting that grassroots work would carry Asia to horizons of success in the coming years. Al Hamad thanked the Asian federations that had given him full confidence to lead athletics on the continent until 2019, promising further work for the best achievements for athletics on the continent.
