Mohammed Sulaiman, assistant secretary-general of the Qatar Athletics Federation, revealed that the elections had gone through complex stages, especially as Al Hamad put forward his programme while others worked to compete against him through both legitimate and illegitimate means, but that what mattered in the end was the triumph of Qatari thinking through the presence of a candidate with sporting standing, backed by our wise leadership in the programmes he presented. He said the trust Al Hamad won was therefore no surprise, since the posts he had previously held made him fully qualified to be the best and to win the trust of 159 federations around the world — a figure that is not easy, especially when considered as a
difficult number unlikely to be repeated easily in IAAF elections.
