Veteran Indian sports administrator Raja Randhir Singh yesterday took over as head of the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) after its Kuwaiti former leader was sentenced to jail in a forgery case.
Sheikh Ahmad al-Fahad Al Sabah, a member of Kuwait’s ruling family, stepped aside as Asia’s top sports official after the Geneva court on Friday found him guilty over a plot against political rivals in the Gulf state.
Singh, 74, said in a statement that he was taking over as interim president as the longest-serving member of the OCA executive.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Taiwan’s national Olympic committee is a member of the OCA.
“I have every confidence that Sheikh Ahmad will be successful in his appeal,” Singh said, adding that he would seek “to ensure the continued smooth running of the organization in the critical period ahead.”
Asia would host the 2022 Winter Olympics in China in February and has just started the one-year countdown to the Asian Games in Hangzhou, China.
Singh, a former Olympic shooter, was a member of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) executive until 2015, and helped bring events such as the 2010 Commonwealth Games to India.
Sheikh Ahmad had been one of the most powerful sports bosses in the world until his court troubles erupted.
He, his English former lawyer, a Kuwaiti aide and two more lawyers based in Geneva in 2014 were convicted on forgery charges linked to orchestrating a sham arbitration case in Geneva.
The sheikh was sentenced to almost 14 months’ jail time with a further 15 months suspended in a case that has put much of his Olympic work on hold for almost three years.
“I know I didn’t do anything. I will wait for the appeal [and] my rights,” Sheikh Ahmad said as he walked away from court with his lawyers, adding that he would return to Geneva to challenge his conviction. “I will never stop because I believe I am innocent.”
The panel of three judges found that the five men took part in a staged legal dispute and arbitration hearing to gain a favorable ruling. It sought to authenticate video footage that would show two Kuwaiti politicians — including a former prime minister — discussing a possible coup in the oil-rich kingdom.
Sheikh Ahmad supported the false arbitration and was its sole beneficiary, presiding judge Delphine Gonseth said.
His sentence was more severe than the public prosecutor had requested — just six months’ jail time with a further two years suspended.
Starting in 1991, he led the OCA, established by his father in 1982. In 1992, Sheikh Ahmad joined the IOC, whose members elect host cities.
His influence grew in 2012 when he was elected president of Association of National Olympic Committees (ANOC), a global group of 206 national Olympic committees. He also chaired an IOC panel that distributes hundreds of millions of dollars to Olympic athletes and teams.
He was a strong supporter in the 2013 election of current IOC president Thomas Bach.
The sheikh stepped aside — “temporarily self-suspended” in the Olympic phrase — from the IOC and ANOC after being indicted by Geneva prosecutors in November 2018.
The IOC on Friday said that the “court decision is now being reviewed by the IOC chief ethics and compliance officer.”
Sheikh Ahmad was also an executive committee member at FIFA for two years, but resigned in 2017 after being implicated by US federal prosecutors in bribing Asian soccer officials.
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