Kuwait City, Kuwait, June 10, 2024: Chinese table tennis legend Ding Ning was elected Chair of the Athletes’ Committee of the Olympic Council of Asia on Monday, June 10.
In an online election where 11 of the 12 members of the OCA Athletes’ Committee participated, Chinese Olympian Ding was voted in as Chair, defeating Saudi Arabia’s Husein Alireza.
“Thank you so much for electing me as Chair. In the future I will try my best for everybody,” Ding said after the result was announced.
The OCA held an election for the Athletes’ Committee for the first time in history during the 19th Asian Games in Hangzhou, China last September and October, and Ding was one of the athletes elected.
The elected athletes met online on Monday to select the new Chair to succeed Mikako Kotani of Japan, who had been Chair for 13 years. Eleven of the 12 members voted for the position of Chair between the two nominations.
In her short candidature speech, Ding said she started playing table tennis at five years old and won 21 gold medals at the Olympic Games, World Cup and World Championships.
This golden haul included three gold medals at the Olympic Games: women’s singles at Rio 2016 and women’s team at London 2012 and Rio 2016. She also won the Olympic silver medal in women’s singles at London 2012.
“My career as an athlete changed my life, made me stronger and gave me passion to work for athletes,” Ding added.
“I was honored to be elected as an OCA Athletes’ Committee member. In future there is still much more for us to do. I hope I can use my skills, experience and passion to make changes.”
Ding said her first goal would be to improve the welfare, training conditions and competition environment for athletes.
“I will also improve sports exchanges and cooperation between National Olympic Committees so as to create dialogue among Asian athletes.”
Outgoing Chair Mikako Kotani, who had hailed this historic online meeting to vote for the Chair of the Athletes’ Committee for the first time, praised the OCA for its forward-thinking by opening the doors of the Executive Board to the newly-elected Ding.
“The OCA has said one male and one female representative from its Athletes’ Committee will be on the Executive Board. Even the IOC does not do this, and it shows the OCA’s commitment to gender equality,” Kotani said.
There were no nominations for the post of Vice Chair of the OCA Athletes’ Committee, and as such no elections were held for this position.
“We will go back to the Executive Board and decide on the Vice Chair position. As the Chair is a female, the Vice Chair will be a male. My congratulations to Ding Ning on being elected as Chair,” said OCA Deputy Director General Vinod Kumar Tiwari.
The other nomination for Chair, Husein Alireza, 30, competed for Saudi Arabia at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in the men’s rowing single sculls. He was born in London and learned to row at Cambridge University while studying for his master’s degree in 2016.
