While acknowledging the significant achievement of Kirsty Coventry becoming the president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA) President Christopher Samuda says he’s optimistic that she’ll find ways to assist the JOA and other national Olympic committees (NOC) to strengthen their finances and governance.

History was made on Thursday when Coventry, a 41-year-old from Zimbabwe, was elected the first woman and African to head the IOC, replacing Thomas Bach.

The two-time Olympic swimming champion, who also serves as Zimbabwe’s minister of sport, secured 49 of the 97 votes available, getting the better of Spain’s Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr, World Athletics President Sebastian Coe, Frenchman David Lappartient, Jordan’s Prince Feisal, Swedish-born Johan Eliasch, and Japan’s Morinari Watanabe.

Samuda says Coventry is more than deserving of the role and her victory sends a powerful message in support of diversity in sports.

“Her election underscores and exemplifies the principles of diversity, which inform our values in the movement and the spirit of Olympism,” he told the Sunday Observer.

“Her ascendancy to the presidency signals an evolution of the movement towards acknowledging and affirming personal credentials and discounting gender, age and territorial criteria. It affirms the concept of egality in a sporting context. Egalitarianism must become a hallmark of our electoral culture throughout the movement.”

Samuda says one of Coventry’s main objectives should be to improve the status of the NOCs, including the JOA, to facilitate the highest level of sporting development.

“Her presidency must continue the decentralisation of decision-making in giving National Olympic Committees a greater sense of ownership of the movement to which we, JOA, belong,” he said. “She must carve out, as best as she can, a role for regional groupings of National Olympic Committees, which goes beyond the staging of games and focuses more on member sustainability, affording commercial opportunities for NOCs and building enabling bi- and multi-lateral partnerships within the movement in further developing economies of scale and capacity.

“The JOA has built a viable governance and business model and looks forward to further strengthening the same through innovation that she will introduce as part of her legacy.”

Samuda says her athletic and administrative experience will be a boost in the IOC’s decision-making.

“As a minister of sport and member of the executive board of the IOC, she has gained invaluable knowledge of the Olympic movement and the experience thereby gained along with her interpersonal skills will permit her to understand the dynamics of policy making and management and personalities which will avail her at the negotiating table in conducting the business of the games and commercial undertakings,” he said.

Following the election on Thursday, Coventry, who will take office on June 24, says she’s committed to collaborating with the NOC’s throughout her tenure for the betterment of the Olympic movement.

“[I’ll] look at the IOC and our Olympic movement and family and decide how exactly we’re going to move forward in the future,” she said. “What is it that we want to focus on in the first six months? I have some ideas, but a part of my campaign was listening to the IOC members and hearing what they have to say and hearing how we want to move together.

“It’s extremely important we have to be a united front and we have to work together. We don’t and we might not always agree, but we have to be able to come together for the betterment of the movement.”