The 15th General Assembly was held in Helsinki.

 SUMMARY REPORT

The 15^th edition of the ENGSO General Assembly was held in Helsinki, May 4-6, with presence of delegates from 31 member countries.

Together with the ENGSO General Assembly which was also electoral, the ENGSO Youth held a Conference “Future Leaders – Empowering Young Europeans” was held May 2-6, and an electoral Assembly of ENGSO Youth.

As an introduction to the ENGSO General Assembly, an EU Pre-Seminar was held, elaborating on the most important issues concerning the sport in the European Union and the future document to be published, the “White Paper on Sport”. This was a chance to hear position of some of the most eminent and eligible persons in this domain, such as President of the Finnish Sports Federation, Mr. Timo Laitinen, Member of the European Parliament, Mr. Lasse Lehtinen, Mr. Pedro Velazquez, Deputy Director of Sport Unit in the Directorate for Education, Culture and Sport, representative of Norway who spoke about the EU Directive on Gambling Services, and many others, after which a panel discussion was held, led by Chairman of the ENGSO EU WG, Mr. Gernot Wainig. It was concluded that the contribution of ENGSO related to all EU matters is extremely important due to significant impact of the ENGSO members in decision making process on all matters of sport.

ENGSO General Assembly was officially opened by the ENGSO President, Mr. Bengt Sevelius, who noted the specificity of sport, its importance and the results attained in all domains of physical activities and who also expressed great appreciation for all that the Finnish Sports Federation has done. President Sevelius also thanked ENGSO Secretary General, Predrag Manojlović and the Secretariat for the exceptional work and excellently prepared ENGSO General Assembly regarding the material and the whole organization of this event in which the cooperation between the ENGSO Secretariat and the Finnish Sports Federation was on an exceptional level. President of the Finnish Sports Federation, Timo Laitinen, also welcomed participants of the General Assembly, and shortly presented the Finnish sport.

After the regular procedure of adoption of the programme, agenda and the minutes from the previous General Assembly held in Malta 2006, the delegates adopted the proposal of the ENGSO ExCom for the change of ENGSO member from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Instead of the Sports Association of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the new member of ENGSO, as organization that will fully comply with all obligations and represent the sport in whole in all the territory of the member country, will be the Olympic Committee of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

It was also mentioned that the Olympic Committee of Romania expressed their wish last year to become member of ENGSO. However, since then they have not presented all necessary documents and this year they have only confirmed their wish to remain for the present only as an observer.

ENGSO General Assembly adopted the reports on the work and activities of the ENGSO ExCom members, the President, Secretary General, Treasurer and Auditors for the previous one year period. ENGSO members positively assessed the reports they adopted and congratulated on the Financial Report and the ENGSO Budget, as well as the transparency in which they were made.

At the proposal of the Secretary General Predrag Manojlović, it was approved that the mandate of the Treasurer shall be extended until June 30, 2007, until when all the necessary procedures for transfer of treasurership should be finalized.

Speaking about the topic of EU and Sport, Member of the European Olympic Committees ExCom, Mr. Kai Holm, mentioned all dilemmas, problems, but also needs related to the EU document entitled “White Paper on Sport”. He emphasized the necessity for EOC and ENGSO continue and develop their cooperation on issues related to all domains of sport throughout Europe.

The topic of the Statement on the EU Directive on gambling services was elaborated by the ENGSO EU WG member, Miss Marije Dippel. On expectations related to EU in future and the position of ENGSO related to the “White Paper on Sport”, spoke President Sevelius. ENGSO delegates adopted the action plan for the forthcoming period as well as the ENGSO activities plan, and the representatives of sport within the Action Platform on diet, physical activities and health.

The representatives of ENGSO partners spoke about the cooperation with ENGSO who attended the ENGSO General Assembly, Mr. Eric de Boever, EUPEA Secretary General, Mrs. Marie Leroux, President Delegate of EASE, Mr. George Diderich, EFPM Treasurer and Mrs. Erika Koenig-Zenz, EWS Secretary General, while the current issues of the CDDS and the future of EPAS in the Council of Europe and the European Sports Conference were further elaborated by President Sevelius, former Secretary General, Mrs. Marlis Rydzy-Goetz and Mr. Toomas Toenise.

Report on ENGSO Youth issues, activities and the action plan for the next period, as well as on results of the General Assembly and the election of ENGSO Youth, was presented by Mr. Jan Holze, Chairman of ENGSO Youth. He underlined the importance that ENGSO Youth gained in becoming the member of EuroChild, having the seat in CoE, and participating in organization of the European Youth and Sports Forum, as well as other events important for youth and young leaders in Europe.

Miss Judith Wood, on behalf of the Vice-President Birgitta Kervinen, presented the novelties within the leadership project ENTER! that was very successfully initiated in Paris 2006.

Miss Kristiina Heinonen and Mr. Jan Bohač, spoke on public relations and communications issues, and congratulated for the excellent work of the ENGSO Secretariat and the administrator of the website of ENGSO and their constant effort to improve and modernize it ever more. The proposal for the new, user-friendly and  updated website was unanimously adopted, as well as the proposal of the Finnish Sports Federation, that the ENGSO Newsletter which they published, is to be sent to the members in electronic form in the future, in order to reduce exceptionally high costs covered by the Finnish Federation and EGNSO.

Jan Bohač emphasized the necessity for all member countries to send regularly the annual Country Reports and the list of experts that should be finalized until May 30, 2007.

One of the most important issues in the past two years was the activity of the ENGSO Developoment Group whose report was adopted after discussion of the members, and the new Strategic Action Plan for the next four-year period. The delegates also accepted the proposal that following the newly adopted Strategic Plan and the activities to be realized in the next period, the membership fees should also be adapted, to be 1000 EUR.

In order to start with the implementation of the newly adopted Strategic plan, the delegates approved the proposal to convene the Extraordinary General Assembly upon the end of the 15^th ENGSO General Assembly, in order to adopt all necessary technical modifications of ENGSO Statutes that will further prompt novelties in the work of ENGSO.

The following representatives from ENGSO member countries were proposed for the vacant positions in ENGSO ExCom: for ENGSO President, Mrs. Birgitta Kervinen (previously Vice-President from Finland), for ENGSO Treasurer, Mr. Jean-Francois Angles (previously ExCom member from France), for ENGSO Vice-President Mr. Toomas Toenise (Estonia), for ENGSO ExCom member for another period of office, Mr. Carlos Cardoso (Portugal), and for new ExCom members Mr. Louis Kilcoyne (Ireland), Mrs. Romana Caput-Jogunica (Croatia) and Mrs. Karen Werell-Wiklund (Švedska).

Chaired by Mr. Gernot Wainig and with the help of Election Committee, composed of Auditors (Mr. Totrakan and Mrs. Szanto), the ENGSO GA delegates accepted the information of President Sevelius about the decision of Mrs. Karen Werell Wiklund from Sweden to withdraw her nomination, and unanimously elected the new ENGSO ExCom, to be composed as follows:

-          ENGSO President - Birgitta Kervinen (FIN),

-          ENGSO Vice-President - Toomas Toenise (EST)

-          ENGSO Secretary General – Predrag Manojlović (SRB)

-          ENGSO Treasurer - Jean-Francois Angles (FRA)

-          ENGSO ExCom members:

–         Jan Bohač (CZE)

–         Louis Kilcoyne (IRE)

–         Romana Caput-Jogunica (CRO)

–         Carlos Cardoso (POR)

The ENGSO Youth elected members of the new Youth Committee, which are:

-          Mr. Jan HOLZE, Chairman (GER)

-          Ms. Anna-Mari Hämäläinen, Vice-Chair (FIN)

–         Doitchin Angelov, Member (BUL)

–         Anna Eliasson, Member (SWE)

–         Yvette Heywood, Member (GBR)

–         Natasa Jankovic, Member (SRB)

–         Barbara Lang, Member (AUT)

–         Eszter Rudas, Member (HUN)

–         Karine Teow, Member (FRA)

The next Forum will be held September 14-16, on Faeroe Islands, and the host will send the topics which will be of their special interest, while others will be those from the special interest from ENGSO.

Representatives of the Turkish Olympic Committee presented the city of Istanbul  as the host of the next ENGSO General Assembly in beginning of May 2008, as part of the celebration of the 100^th anniversary of the Olympic Committee. The next hosts would be France in 2009, and based on the proposal of the Olympic Committee of Serbia, Belgrade, in 2010.

Having concluded the ENGSO 15^th General Assembly, the Extraordinary Assembly, purposed to adopt the modifications and amendments of the ENGSO Statutes, as well as a special amendment and an article that would introduce the position of the Honorary President, honorary and honour members, adopted all proposals and adjourned the Extraordinary Assembly of ENGSO.

As the first Honorary Preisdent, delegates of the ENGSO General Assembly decided to nominate Mr. Bengt Sevelius, President of ENGSO for many years.

With expressions of gratitude to the previous ENGSO President, representatives of ENGSO ExCom and country members presented special mementos with wishes for him to continue with his enormous contribution to the ever growing and promoted image of ENGSO in future and the history he created with his extraordinarily committed work.

The new President Kervinen thanked everyone for their support, the Finnish Sports Federation and ENGSO Secretariat for the excellent organization of the General Assembly, exceptional contribution of all present deletgates and wished successful work to everyone in the forthcoming four-year period, adjourning thus the event of the 15^th ENGSO General Assembly. 

                                                                                                                                Predrag Manojlovic

                                                                                                                                ENGSO Secretary General