Council elected
Four-year term begins for IIHF leadership
Five new members join the IIHF Council after the 2016 IIHF Annual Congress in Moscow has voted on the leadership for a new four-year term.
The executive of the International Ice Hockey Federation includes 13 voting members and the General Secretary, Horst Lichtner, as a non-voting member. And the race for the places has been very tight in the end.
The elections began the applications for the President and the three Vice Presidents. Rene Fasel was the only applicant to serve as President and was unanimously elected to serve a new four-year term in the position. The same with the three Vice Presidents: Kalervo Kummola will continue his mandate as Vice President representing Europe and Africa, Bob Nicholson for the Americas and Thomas Wu for Asia and Oceania. Chunlu Wang from China withdrew her application.
“The success of international ice hockey has been achieved thanks to consensus among stakeholders. Consent and finding compromises are important and our strategy won’t change for the new term,” Fasel said in his opening speech and underlined the goal to continue with NHL participation at the Olympic Winter Games for the sixth consecutive time, the Champions Hockey League that concluded its second season, ice hockey in Asia and the growth of women’s hockey.
“In Asia we were given the golden opportunity to grow the game with the 2018 Olympic Winter Games in Korea and the 2022 Olympic Winter Games in China,” Fasel said.
“We have two Olympic Games upcoming in Asia. Asia is a very big continent with a big population and I’m happy to continue to serve as a bridge and make hockey better known in Asia. It’s an exciting time for hockey in Asia,” Thomas Wu added.
A point Fasel outlined in particular was player safety.
