Samih Moudallal

Mohammad Samih Moudallah started in sports as a weightlifting champion in Syria, competing from 1952-72. During that time he won several Arab Championships, and placed seventh at the 1965 World Weightlifting Championships.

Moudallah was educated at the University of Damascus with a masters’ degree in social and economic planning. He later became a director of planning and statistics for the National Finance Ministry in Syria, and served as General Secretary of the Syrian Parliament.

In sports administration Moudallah was President of the Syrian National Weightlifting Federation from 1970-81, President of the Arab Weightlifting and Bodybuilding Federation from 1970-81, and President of the Syrian Olympic Committee from 1982-2000, after which he was named Life President in 2009.

With the IOC, Moudallah was a member of several commissions, as follows: Marketing (2002-14), Culture and Olympic Education (2004-15), 2009 Congress (2009), Olympic Philately, Numismatic and Memorabilia (2014-15), and Culture and Olympic Heritage (2015-19)