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Johannesburg - Athletics South Africa will replace former president Leonard Chuene at a special general meeting in Johannesburg on Saturday.
The positions of president and vice-president were left vacant after the SA Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee found Chuene and former ASA vice-president Kakata Maponyane guilty of financial impropriety in February.
Chuene was banned from involvement in any sport under the jurisdiction of SASCOC for seven years, and Maponyane was handed a five-year ban.
The nine nominees put forward for the president's post earlier this month included current ASA chairman James Evans, who was left in temporary charge of the federation after the new board took the reins of ASA in September last year.
Evans said on Friday it was encouraging that there were so many candidates who believed they stood a realistic chance of leading the embattled federation.
"I hope open elections will bring stability to the sport afterwards," said Evans.
"It is quite positive that so many are standing, which is not like in the past when one guy stood.
"The flip side is that there is some naivety with some of the candidates as it is a full time job."
Evans said possible candidates had previously been too scared to put their names forward.
Being at the helm of athletics for more than eight months, he believed he had a good idea of the challenges facing the sport.
"There are a couple of problems," Evans said.
"First of all would be to get the administrative structures in place, then there is the challenge of acquiring funding and the issue of establishing proper developmental structures."
The race to fill the two posts had already seen one casualty after ASA athletes' chair and former sprinter Geraldine Pillay withdrew shortly after the list of nominees was released to the provinces and associate members.
An unprecedented number of nominees were submitted, with nine candidates for president and 10 for vice-president initially put forward.
A total of 59 votes were up for grabs -- two each for the 17 provinces, and one each for the seven associate members, eight board members and 10 athletics commission members.
The newly elected officials would only have nine months in their posts, Evans said, as the current management term was set to come to an end in April.
Western Province, which Evans headed as president, had tabled a motion preventing anyone on the National Lottery distribution board from sitting on the ASA Board.
One of the nominees for the president's post, ASA board member Motlatsi Keikabile of Athletics North West, was already on the National Lottery distribution board.
Marathon runner and assistant ASA administrator Hendrick Ramaala was also among the nominees for the chief post.
Boland athletics chief Harold Adams, who was ASA chief medical officer when Caster Semenya competed at the 2009 World Athletics Championships amid a cloud of controversy, was another whose name was put forward.
KwaZulu-Natal Athletics president Aleck Skhosana, fielding off a barrage of criticism from clubs in his province amid allegations of financial impropriety, was among the nominees for both president and vice-president.
Central Gauteng Athletics president James Moloi was also set to run for both the president's and vice-president's posts, and according to an ASA source, he was the dark horse heading in to the elections.
