Selection of World Congress Site 2006Following more than a year of work by the Administrative Council of the IUPESM and its Congress Coordinating Committee, the site for the 2006 World Congress has finally been resolved. Korea was selected by a majority of the delegates to the IUPESM General Assembly. This was a very long and arduous process that created considerable friction and animosity between individuals and groups. Now that the matter is settled, I hope that for the sake of our profession, every member of our organisation will consider this issue to have been concluded so that we can move ahead to other important and pressing issues. I have decided to summarise the major events that led to re-vote, which was necessitated by the Korea appeal. I hope this will clarify the various actions and decisions by the IUPESM Administrative Council and lay to rest any misunderstandings or misconceptions that have surrounded this affair. After the vote of the 27 July 2000 General Assembly in favour of the site of Lausanne for the 2006 WC, Korea submitted an appeal to the IUPESM Administrative Council (AC). According to the IUPESM Congress Coordinating Committee (CCC) guidelines, the only appeal permitted is on the basis of procedural errors. Korea's appeal stated that the IUPESM CCC violated its own procedures during the solicitation of bids and during the selection process. This constituted a legitimate appeal and therefore the AC was obligated to act on the appeal, adding it to the agenda of its July 28 meeting that followed shortly after the meeting of the July 27, 2000 General Assembly. After an extensive debate and an examination of facts, which were not available prior to the vote by the General Assembly, the AC concluded that the Korean appeal had sufficient merit to warrant a re-vote and voted to approve it. Just before the AC were to announce its decision for a re-vote to the Delegates, we received a letter from Robert W. Neilson, General Secretary of the Institute of Physics and Engineering in Medicine in the UK, questioning the validity of the proceedings during the July 28 meeting of the IUPESM Administrative Council in Chicago. One concern had to do with a motion that was made during the meeting by an individual who was no longer a member of the AC. (This motion was not related to the appeal.) Another concern had to do with an error in recording a vote count. In addition, Dr Neilson challenged the authority of the AC to override the vote of the IUPESM General Assembly and the decision of the AC to go ahead with a re-vote. Due to the sensitivity of the issue and the ambiguity of the IUPESM statutes, the AC accepted Professor's Neilson's recommendation and made two important decisions:
The Council discussed this matter during a lengthy virtual meeting that was completed at the end of March 2001. The motion to recommend to the General Assembly that the appeal by Korea be approved passed with the following votes: 7 Council members voting to approve the motion, none against the motion, and 2 abstentions. As a result of the AC discussion during its virtual meeting, there was an opportunity to examine in great detail the submission process for all the proposals to host the 2006 WC. Consequently, many procedural errors were discovered in addition to the procedural errors that were named in the appeal by Korea. None of these errors were the fault of the prospective hosts and this statement has been articulated repeatedly in every communication to the voting members of both organisations. Nevertheless, while these errors, made by the previous CCC, were clearly unintentional, they seriously affected the review and voting process prior to the 27 July 2000 vote by the General Assembly. These errors provided added support to the decision by the AC recommending a re-vote for the site selection. The most important procedural errors that were brought to light as we investigated the sequence of events before the General Assembly meeting included:
In the event of missing or unclear information, the CCC follows a standard procedure in which they request clarification from the prospective host. This was done for the proposals from Hong Kong, Israel and Korea. However, due to the late submission of the final joint proposal from the European Consortium, the members of the CCC never reviewed their proposal. The CCC was, therefore, unable to clarify certain extremely important issues related to this proposal before it was presented to the General Assembly for a vote. (The European Consortium later clarified these items during the re-voting process.) As a result of its extensive discussions and deliberations during the virtual meeting, the AC, therefore, recommended that the General Assembly approve the appeal by Korea and hold a re-vote to consider the 2006 World Congress site. The delegates were asked to vote on the following motion: "To rescind the decision of the 27 July 2000 General Assembly and approve the recommendation of the IUPESM Administrative Council for a re-vote on the site selection for the 2006 World Congress". Delegates were then given 2 weeks to provide comments and opinions for or against this motion. Comments that were received by the AC were forwarded to all the delegates for consideration before the vote on this motion was taken. As you all know, the delegates voted overwhelmingly to approve the motion proposed by the Council and to hold a re-vote for the site. Each potential host was then asked to complete a short questionnaire. The completed questionnaires were sent to all delegates so that they could compare the information and make an informed decision. In addition, the information was posted on the IUPESM web site. A 3-week discussion period was announced and delegates were asked for comments and opinions. Comments received from the delegates were posted on the same web site. Delegates were urged to carefully read the material on the web before casting their vote for the 2006 Congress venue. On September 17, just before the ballots for the re-vote were sent out, the European Consortium withdrew its bid for the 2006 Congress. Among the reasons given by the Consortium for its withdrawal was the important statement that "...in order to prevent any further deterioration in international relations within the Medical Physics and Clinical Engineering community, we are withdrawing our bid to hold the 2006 congress.". I responded by stating: "I deeply regret that the Consortium had to make this difficult decision, particularly in light of the considerable efforts all of you made in getting 3 countries to work together, in the preparation of the bid and the ensuing discussions. I would like, however, to applaud the organisers of the European bid for recognising the danger of divisiveness that this issue could have brought to our profession and rising to the cause of uniting the IUPESM community." Following the withdrawal of the European Consortium, there remained 3 prospective hosts: Hong Kong, Korea and Israel. The results of the re-vote gave the 2006 World Congress to Korea.
Dov Jaron
|