By Sports Reporter/Doha
Qatar Motor and Motorcycling Federation (QMMF) president Nasser Khalifa al-Attiyah has lashed out at Mohamed bin Sulayem, president of the UAE Automobile and Touring Club and vice-president of Federation Internationale D’Automobile (FIA), for attempting to remove the Qatari and Kuwaiti legs of the Middle East Rally Championship and replace them with a new round in Iran.
A statement from al-Attiyah’s office said that bin Sulayem wanted to get Iran’s support in an attempt to marginalise the Qatari and Kuwaiti federations in the upcoming election for the presidency of the FIA.
Bin Sulayem was to stand against the incumbent president Jean Todt from France and David Ward from Britain. However, this was before al-Attiyah had publicly announced his support to Todt, following which bin Sulayem withdrew his candidature.
This story starts when al-Attiyah attended the Lebanese International Rally, the fourth round of the Middle East Championship and was surprised during one of the special meetings to finalise the 2014 calendar when he saw the proposal to modify the championship by excluding the two rounds of Qatar and Kuwait from the official championship, and to consider them as a ‘practice’ for the official rounds.
Additionally a proposal for a new round to be held in Iran was put forward by the Emirati Federation president bin Sulayem, the man tasked by the FIA for promoting and supporting the Middle East Rally Championship. Al-Attiyah immediately sent an official letter to the FIA asking the international body to reject the proposal and attempted to contact bin Sulayem by telephone to inquire about these amendments. Bin Sulayem however did not answer the telephone calls,
according to al-Attiyah.
However, co-ordination between the QMMF president and a number of officials in the FIA resulted in the freezing of the proposal until the date of the General Assembly meeting was conducted. At the FIA meeting which was held recently in Croatia and attended by al-Attiyah as the cross country rally committee president, he stressed that the Qatar Rally is not only the opening round for the Middle East Championship but is one of the most important rounds as it attracts the best drivers in the business.
Furthermore, during the meeting bin Sulayem announced that all the federations were aware of and in agreement with the amendments including Qatar and Kuwait. Al-Attiyah denied this, showing bin Sulayem’s position to be less than tenable.
Following on from this, the FIA announced its rejection of bin Sulayem’s suggestion and has tasked its competition committee to decide the 2014 calendar.
QMMF president Nasser Khalifa al-Attiyah (R) with FIA chief Jean Todt.
