KUALA LUMPUR: Zaiton Othman was awarded the International Olympics Council (IOC) Women and Sports award for Asia at the 5th World Conference on Women and Sport in Los Angeles, recently.

File pic of Zaiton Othman winning the Olympic Council of Malaysia Women and Sports Award in 2009.

   The conference, held once in four years, was  organised jointly by the IOC, the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) and the Southern California Committee for the Olympic Games, saw  a range of subjects, in both plenary and dialogue sessions, associated with the efforts to strengthen women's representation both in the field of sports and in leadership positions discussed.

    Over 700 delegates  attended the two-day conference.

    Themed Together Stronger: the Future of Sport, the  conference saw high-level speakers from a variety of backgrounds in attendance. Among them were IOC President Jacques Rogge; the IOC's Women and Sport Commission chairperson, Anita DeFrantz; Chairman of the London Organising Committee of the Olympic Games and Paralympic Games, Sebastian Coe; Marjon V. Kamara, Chair of the UN's Commission on Status of Women and actress Geena Davis, Academy award winner  and founder of the Geena Davis Institute in Gender in the media.

    Datuk  Low Beng Choo, the vice-president of the Kuala Lumpur-based  Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) and chairperson of the OCM Women and Sport Committee, attended the conference together with Zaiton, who is also a committee member of the OCM Women and Sport Committee.

   Beng Choo, who is a member of the IOC Women Sport Commission, made  a presentation at the conference, as one of the speaker-panelists, on "Setting the Pace for a Sustainable Responsibility: The Regional Agenda."

    "It is indeed an honour to see Zaiton being awarded the IOC Women and Sports award for Asia. To be awarded at the World Conference on Women and Sport which is held once in four years is even more meaningful and significant in view of the worldwide delegation attending the conference  as compared to the other annual awards presentation ceremonies," said Beng Choo.

    "The award is another feather in the cap for Malaysian women's effort in Malaysia to develop, encourage and strengthen the participation of women and girls at all levels in the field of sports, and in particular as sports leaders."

    Zaiton was nominated for the Asian award by the OCM.

    "It is an honour to be recognised at the Asian-level. And to receive the award at the prestigious World Conference on Women and Sport is indeed a recognition to be remembered forever," said Zaiton the Director of the Organisational Development and Athletes' Affairs Department at the National Sports Council.

    Zaiton  won the IOC Women and Sports Achievement Diploma in 2010 and was also the 2009 winner of the OCM Women and Sport Award.

    "I thank the OCM for nominating me and the IOC for having given me the Asian award. This award is for all the women leaders in Malaysia. I am passionate about women sports as a former athlete myself and was not looking for awards," she said.

   "This recognition will make me work even harder as I have been recognised and have to live up to the faith put in me to further promote women sports, not only in Malaysia, but also in Asia," added  Zaiton who is nicknamed "Iron Lady of Athletics" for her domination of  the gruelling heptathlon event for over a decade from 1979 and winning medals at the Sea Games, Asian Games and Asian Track and Field championships.

    Her best performance was at the 11th SEA Games in Manila in 1981 where she won three  gold medals in the heptathlon, 4 x 100m and 4 x 400m relay, creating new national records in all the three events and setting the all-time Asian best in the 4 x 400m relay.

   The heptathlon record set in 1981 is  the longest standing record and is  yet to be broken in Malaysian Track Field.

    Besides athletics, Zaiton  also excelled in hockey, netball, softball, basketball and volleyball.

    Zaiton, who  won the 1982 National Sportswoman of the Year award, is a trained sports psychologist.

She is also a physical educationist who devotes full time to guiding, counselling and motivating youths, especially women to pursue excellence as athletes, coaches and officials.

    She obtained a Bachelor Degree from University Putra Malaysia and a Masters in Physical Education (Applied Sports Psychology) from the San Diego State University, California  in 1992.

    After her retirement from competition, Zaiton  continued to be active as a coach and administrator at national level in athletics.

She was the Chef-de-Mission of the Malaysian contingent to the 4th World Women Islamic Games in  Tehran in 2005 and was the Deputy Chef-de-Mission to the Southeast Asian Games in Bangkok  in 2007.

   Zaiton has also presented seminar papers and forum presentations, both in Malaysia and other countries  on women in sports, sports psychology, motivation, athlete, coach and association relation.