The first week of November 2026 was dedicated to three dates with the three candidates in the FEI presidential election at this year’s FEI General Assembly in China. Three very accomplished candidates are running and together they span the globe: Mark Samuel (CAN), Sabrina Ibáñez (ESA), and Jack Huang (TPE).
All three candidates agreed to Zoom meetings on a date and time frame judged to fit the majority of our IAEJ members. We asked for thirty minutes to be spent on the candidate’s own presentation and pitch, five common questions sent in advance to the candidates, and then an open floor for questions online /in the zoom chat/ sent in advance. The sessions were moderated by board member Kim C Lundin and Jan Tönjes, president of IAEJ. It was a welcome change that all candidates gave freely and willingly of their, no doubt, precious time to engage in open questions from members participating, as well as giving well-thought-through answers to our general questions.
The three sessions are recorded and available for all IAEJ members, and we can distribute links to the sessions on YouTube. Each session can be used for quotes for those of you wishing to write articles. The only reason to NOT publish the links openly is to keep the exclusivity for members planning to publish articles on the subject of the three candidates and their respective answers.
Please feel free to email us, and we will send you the links so you can take part and make use of this very valid but time-sensitive material.
A common denominator between the three candidates was their willingness to enter into an era of more communication with the media and the IAEJ in particular. “Communication is key” was a phrase used more than once, and from the IAEJ, we look forward to arranging open Zoom sessions biannually with the next FEI president.
This will, as our longtime revered Dutch member Jacob Melissen so cleverly put it in our last session, “end the era of the FEI being as closed as an oyster”. Indeed, if we could accomplish that, we are looking forward to a paradigm shift.
To ensure such an endeavour is successful, we need more member engagement from you. Send in questions, make time, and participate in the discussion, making it a dialogue and not a monologue.
The IAEJ wishes all candidates a continued good campaign, and may the best candidate be elected on the 5th of December in Jiangyin (CHN).
