VFF Delegation participants the 33rd AFC Congress Bahrain 2023 (period 2023 – 2027)

Attending the congress were FIFA President Gianni Infantino and 45 member organizations of the Continental Football Confederations. The delegation of the Vietnam Football Federation (VFF) attending the Congress included Vice President Tran Anh Tu, Vice President Nguyen Trung Kien and Deputy General Secretary Nguyen Thanh Ha. VFF President Tran Quoc Tuan attended the Congress as a member of the AFC Executive Committee.

  03/02/2023 16:20:27

After welcoming the delegates to the Congress, AFC President Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa looked back at the achievements of Asian football in recent years. The chairman the AFC said that Asian football is growing stronger.

In the speech, FIFA President Gianni Infantino also expressed the impressive achievements that Asian football has achieved in recent years. The leader of the largest football federation on the planet emphasized on the two events that Asian countries are trusted to organize, the 2017 Women’s U17 World Cup in India and especially the 2022 World Cup in Qatar, which is consider as the best event ever”.

“The Women’s World Cup was held in two countries, in which the Vietnamese women’s team and the Philippines women’s team participated for the first time. Although two countries belong to two different federations, football shows cohesion. Asian football is really strong. It is an effective combination between FIFA and AFC to make Asian football even stronger,” said Gianni Infantino.

One of the most important task of the Congress is to elect the President, 5 Vice Presidents, 6 FIFA Council members, 5 female members of the Executive Committee and 9 members of the Executive Committee for the term 2023-2027.

With the high confidence of the Congress, current AFC President Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa was re-elected as AFC President for the term 2023-2027. Mr. Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa is the only candidate for this position. Similarly, the 5 Vice Presidents representing 5 regions in Asia was also determined at the Congress, including: Mr. Hachem Haidar (Lebanon, representative of West Asia), Mr. Mehdi Taj (Iran, representative of Central Asia), Mr. Ugen Tsechup (Bhutan, representative of South Asia), Mr. Zaw Zaw (Myanmar, representative of Southeast Asia) and Mr. Ganbaatar Amgalanbaatar (Mongolia, representative of East Asia region).

The Congress conducted a vote to elect 6 FIFA Council Members (including 1 female member elected from 5 female members of the Executive Committee), 5 female members of the Executive Committee and 9 members of the Executive Committee. Before the congress, the AFF sent an official document to the AFC to introduce Mr. Tran Quoc Tuan – VFF President – as the representative of Southeast Asia to join the AFC Executive Committee for the term 2023-2022. The decision to introduce Mr. Tran Quoc Tuan representing Southeast Asia in the AFC Executive Committee has received high consensus in the AFF Council and will be officially approved at the AFF Congress in upcoming March. After being approved by the AFF Congress, Mr. Tran Quoc Tuan automatically took the position of the AFC Executive Committee for the term 2023-2027 as a representative of Southeast Asia, without the same voting round as other candidates at the Congress.

On the other hand, the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Member Associations have confirmed the Saudi Arabian Football Federation (SAFF) as the host association for the AFC Asian Cup 2027™.