I am pleased to present this, the
final report of our committee, to the General Assembly of WCA 2012.

Our first item of business entailed
giving effect to the resolutions of the 53^rd General Assembly of WCA
2008 in Cape Town, South Africa. In this regard, a constitutional amendment was
approved to ensure greater and more meaningful participation of member
societies in the election of officers of the federation. Article 4.3 previously
allowed for the Executive Committee to decide the final list of candidates for
election as officers of the Federation. With the constitutional amendment in
place, member societies will from now henceforth have the ability to determine
the final list of candidates for election to the different offices.

Regulations guiding this revised
electoral system have been detailed in the Administrative Manual which has
itself undergone extensive revisions and updating to ensure that the activities
of the federation are in accordance with the letter and spirit of the
constitution.

These two projects owe their success
to the collaborative effort between the Constitution Committee and Executive
Committee, and I am hugely indebted to everyone for all their input.

The 54^th General Assembly
will be asked to consider three new constitutional amendments, notice of which
has already been circulated to member societies. In this regard, the
Constitution Committee has been tasked with writing the founding articles to
establish the Scientific Committee and Professional Wellbeing Committee as
standing committees of the WFSA. These will be tabled at the General Assembly
and allied to this will be a proposal to disband the Foundation Committee.

As previously stated in our annual
reports, the constitution is there to give form to the objectives and guidance
to the activities of the Federation. It must therefore undergo continual
renewal so that it remains relevant to the changing milieu in which we must
function. Accordingly the committee once again extends an open invitation to
members to identify any issues of a regulatory nature that have the potential
to impair delivery of the Federation’s mandate.

My thanks and appreciation go to the
following committee members for their invaluable contributions in the past four
years:

Dr Gonzalo Barreiro

Dr Florian Nuevo

Dr David Wilkinson

Dr Yoshinori Nakata