Egyptian President Morsi meets Paralympic mission before London

London 2012 Paralympic Cairo – Omar Akbanouby Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi received Thursday the paralympic mission that will participate to the olympics London 2012 in the Federal Presedential Palace to motivate them before going through the expected session of competitions.
The meeting was attended by 81 members of the participating teams representing some players and technical authorities in addition to the minister of State for Sport Affairs Ameri Farouk, General director of the National Council for Disabilities Hala Abdel Khalek and Dr Hossam Eldin Mostafa, chairman of the Egyptian paralympic committee.
During his meeting with the Egyptain paralympic committee, Morsi stressed their mission in London is not only sport, but they will have an important role to deliver a message to the world about the stability experienced in Egypt at the moment and the democratic path the country is leading since the January 25 revolution in 2011.
Morsi announced his full support to sports generally and particulatly to the disabled, noting that sports are not luxury, but a necessity for the advancement of people and asked them to achieve better results than those of 2008 Olympics.
General Director of the National Council for Disability, Hala Abdel Khalek, held a speech in front of Morsi demanding the need to support disabled sports and solve the crisis of the headquarters of the council which saw an immediate response from the Egyptain President who promised to create a new system for disabled people in Egypt.
The Minister of Sports, Farouk, spoke about the requirements of the Egyptian athletes in the current phase and especially for disabled, in addition to the crisis of the return of football competitions next September.
Morsi asked Amri to modify the list of bonuses which the winners of the paralympics will receiver after their participation in the Olympics, ensuring their increased motivation before leaving for England.
The Egyptian Paralympic mission will travel on Saturday to England to enter a closed training camp in Lancashire before the opening of the competitions for the disabled on Wednesday.
The Egyptian Paralympic mission have made great achievements since the last Olypmics in Beijing 2008 where they won 12 medals including four golds, four silvers and four bronzes to occupy 29th place in the international Paralympic medal table.
Beijing 2008 witnessed the Egyptian weight lifting team breaking several records, where Egypt won four gold medals in weights of 82.5kg for women by Heba Sayed Ahmed, 56 km for women by Fatma Omar, 67.5 kg for men by Metwally Ibrahim, 56kg for men by Sherif Othman, in addition to three silver medals won by Osama Abdel Monem, Amal Mahmoud and Randa Tag Eldin and three bronze medals by Zeinab Khalifa, Shaaban Desouky and Nadia Fekry.
The Egyptian weightlifter Sherif Othman broke the international and paralymic record in the 56kg category in his first attempt to lift 196kg, then again broke the record by lifting 200kg on his second try and 202 kg on his last try.
The Egyptain weightlifters again received attention when lifter Heba Sayed Ahmed recorded four new records for the 82.5kg  category in four lifts, where in the first try she lifted 145 kg to break the international record set by Chinese Zhang Li Ping, then continued record breaking and registering new numbers by lifting 155 kg.