DOHA: The GCC countries are committed to promoting sports among its youth by hosting a slew of important events in the upcoming years — the Secretary General of the Qatar Olympic Commitee (QOC), Sheikh Saoud bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, said yesterday.
“All GCC countries are playing their part in hosting top sports events for athletes of the region. Saudi Arabia will host the second GCC Games from October 17 to 28,” Sheikh Saoud said during a television interview.
Sheikh Saoud was addressing the media after the first meeting of regional sports ministers and heads of GCC Olympic committees, which kicked off in Doha yesterday.
“Oman is ready to (host the) GCC Women’s Games to be held in Muscat from March 8-18,” Sheikh Saoud pointed out. “Let’s not forget that Doha will welcome the top athletes in the region for the second Beach Games in April.”
Last week the QOC announced that the second GCC Beach Games, which will be held between April 2 and 9 at two venues in Doha, would feature seven disciplines.
Oman will welcome regional women athletes at the GCC Women’s Games that will feature competitions in athletics, bowling, basketball, handball, tennis, taekwondo, volleyball, shooting, endurance horse racing and wheelchair athletics.
Sheikh Saoud said the meeting, attended by the secretaries general of the GCC Olympic committees, would make recommendations on how to get more young people interested in sports.
The QOC Secretary General said further discussions would be held in the next three days on how to develop the sports sector in GCC countries.
Meanwhile, Mohammed Ali Al Kamali, Secretary General of the UAE Olympic Committee, praised Qatar’s National Sport Day and pointed out that improving sports at the grassroots level remained the key to future success.
“We discussed many important matters today,” Al Kamali said. “Qatar’s National Sport Day was widely appreciated and we are thinking of taking the idea to the UAE also. We were discussing the criteria that we may need to follow to initiate a similar programme.”
“We will soon host the Under-16 Youth Games. We will soon make a recommendation to the higher educational authority to make provision for a sports class in schools,” he added.
“If our recommendation is approved then we can promote sports at the grassroots level. We are currently working on this as this is part of our Vision 2021. We often talk about professional sport but we ignore the culture of sports among the kids,” Al Kamali said.
“When we talk about grassroots sports we mean sports at schools. In UAE we back sports that we feel we can win medals in. We have a programme called ‘UAE Dreams’. We are focusing on a set of eight disciplines,” he said.
“What’s happening in Qatar with their National Sport Day is a clear signal that sports should be a way of life. I think this should be part of all GCC sports calendars. What we should probably do is make this event last for more than one day,” he said.
“We know that the Emir,
H H Sheikh Tamim Hamad bin Hamad Al Thani, is backing the Sport Day programme. It is beneficial for all,” he said. “We will host the Youth Games next year. We just don’t want to host the event. We want to prepare programmes for parents as well so that we have better communication,” Al Kamali said.
“We keep evaluating sports policies. We feel we are weak in our sports sector. We are strong when we talk about economics and tourism etc. We want to improve in sports as well,” he said. “We formed our national Olympic committee in 1980. From then until now, we have won only one gold medal at the Olympics. We want to improve on this and we are working on this with absolute seriousness,” he said.
“We will have more meetings in the coming days,” Al Kamali added. THE PENINSULA
