HRH Prince Feisal delivers call to action for safe sport and gender equality at Panam Sports Women in Sport Conference

9 March 2023; Panama City, Panama: Jordan Olympic Committee President and International Olympic Committee (IOC) Executive Board Member, HRH Prince Feisal Al-Hussein, emphasised the importance of safeguarding for the future of sport during a keynote speech at the Panam Sports Women in Sport Conference.

The two-day seminar was held on 7 and 8 March 2023 to coincide with International Women’s Day and Prince Feisal, who is also Chair of the Prevention of Harassment and Abuse in Sport Working Group, and Vice Chair of the IOC’s Gender Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Commission, focused on the importance of ensuring every National Olympic Committee (NOC) in the Panam region has staff dedicated to safeguarding.

Prince Feisal said: “The IOC’s safeguarding certification was designed to give people the required expertise to address all the issues of safeguarding. I encourage all NOCs to put at least one safeguarding officer forward to go through this course.

“They can become the centre for your work on ensuring safeguarding exists. Not just within NOCs, but they can help implement programmes that clubs and federations can use so that we can get the word out. This way we can work more effectively, we can work more efficiently and we can tackle this problem.”

HRH also shared his early experiences in safeguarding and gender equality before acknowledging that the cultural change needed to ensure safe sport for everyone will be a huge challenge to implement. He went on to reiterate the importance of everyone in sport working together on this issue.

He said: “It is going to be a challenge, but that is what the Olympic Games is about. It is about the challenge of being better, being stronger, being faster and about doing your best for sport. This is no different. I please urge you to take this seriously.

“We have to work together in order to stop harassment and abuse from happening in sport and to make it a safe environment.

“As the IOC President said, we modified the Olympic motto, Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together, and it is only together that we will be able to start moving and changing the world.”

IOC President, Thomas Bach,  opened the seminar with a video message and following his speech, Prince Feisal sat on a panel to discuss gender-based violence in sport alongside fellow experts. IOC Vice President Nicole Hoevertsz, IOC Member and the first female President of Costa Rica Laura Chinchilla, and the Regional Director of UN Women Maria Noel Vaeza were all present to deliver their expertise over the course of the seminar.