Mies, Switzerland, Mar 17, 2016: FIBA’s Central Board held its first meeting of 2016 on Friday-Saturday 11-12 March at the House of Basketball.
On Saturday, the Board announced that the 2016 FIBA U17 World Championships for Men and Women will take place in Zaragoza, Spain and revealed the hosts of the 2017 FIBA U19 World Championships.
It also approved the guidelines that will govern the FIBA Basketball World Cup Qualifiers under FIBA’s new competition system. It was presented with an update of the implementation plan currently underway to ensure that all National Member Federations are ready for November 2017, when the new calendar comes into effect.
Following the decision to have the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019 played in China, the Board approved the change of one host city, with Shanghai taking the place of Suzhou, subject to the positive result of an evaluation visit scheduled for April. Mr Burton Shipley, FIBA Executive Committee Member and FIBA Oceania President, was appointed Chairman of the Coordination Commission for the 2019 edition of FIBA’s flagship competition, following his successful work as Chair of the Evaluation Commission for the same event.
The bidding process to select the host(s) of the 2023 edition of FIBA’s flagship event was discussed. The possibility of having bids consisting of multiple host countries – along with single-host country bidders – was approved. FIBA will send out a circular letter to all its National Member Federations this summer to launch the bidding process. It will conclude in June 2017, when final bid presentations are to be selected and the choice of the host(s) made.
Following the decision taken by all members at the Extraordinary World Congress in Istanbul, Turkey in 2014 and after more than a year under the ‘ONE FIBA’ governance model, the Board received a status report regarding the transformation of the five zones – Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania – into FIBA subsidiaries. The opening of a new office for Europe in Mies was re-confirmed and staffing of this office should be completed by end of 2017. The Board issued the Governance Commission a mandate to analyse the progress made and provide advice for improvements, where required, to the model.
A report on the status of 3×3 basketball was presented to the Board and confirmed FIBA’s readiness in submitting a proposal to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) in due course to have 3×3 included as an additional discipline to basketball’s sport programme at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.
The Board was pleased to reveal that, as part of the FIBA National Federations Long-Term Development programme, 75 National Federations had been visited so far. Following each visit, customised development strategies are proposed to each National Federation, with the aim of implementing concrete development programmes in collaboration with the national basketball governing body of the given country/territory.
Following the success of the first-ever meeting of the Players’ Commission in October 2015, the Central Board gave a mandate to FIBA’s Legal Commission to explore additional ways of including more former players in the structures of national federations.
On Friday, the members of the Board witnessed the Draw Ceremony for the Rio 2016 Olympic Basketball Tournaments before visiting the Olympic Museum in the Olympic capital of Lausanne, where they got the chance to meet with IOC President Thomas Bach. —- FIBA
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.