THE Sports Industry Coalition (SIC), which represents the majority of mass participation sporting event industry players in Malaysia, disagrees with the extension of the lockdown and delays in the reopening of businesses as announced by the Prime Minister and Minister of Defence respectively recently.
SIC has issued a protest letter to the Minister of Youth and Sports (KBS), YB Dato' Sri Reezal Merican dated 30 June 2021 regarding this issue with recommendations and calls for financial support from the government for the mass participation sporting industry.
The mass participation industry in Malaysia has been shut since March 2020 without revenue or assistance from the government for the past 16 months. This prolonged closure as announced by the government is pushing the industry to the brink of collapse.
SIC believes that the current extension does not have proper justifications or supporting scientific data based on the ongoing vaccination strategies and Covid-19 numbers. The industry recommends that the government considers reopening by area, district or town instead of imposing a blanket lockdown.
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused sporting events across the globe to come to an unexpected halt, resulting in massive financial losses and uncertainty over the future of the industry. Majority of the SIC members are struggling to make ends meet as there has been no revenue since March 2020.
With the constant delays in reopening and without financial support from the government, the industry no longer has cash flow or the ability to carry on. Expenses such as loan repayments, rental and salary are ongoing monthly commitments and failure to pay has resulted in some members being sued by banks and creditors.
Based on a survey conducted by SIC in 2020, over 90% of mass participation sporting events were postponed or cancelled, resulting in an unprecedented economic loss of over 95% in revenue and a major reduction of 85% in total workforce. Industry players such as event organisers, service providers, suppliers as well as related manufacturers were affected, with their earnings taking a nosedive to zero income since the beginning of the pandemic.
Mass participation sporting events in 2019 attracted over 4.2 million participants, including inbound travellers supporting the sports tourism sector, which contributed over RM 1.3 billion in economic impact. However, since March 2020, the industry has been largely ignored by the government.
In our latest letter to the Minister, SIC has expressed the following:
1) We urge the government to consider:
• to reopen the mass participation events industry on a smaller scale latest by August 2021. SIC members will use this opportunity to do test events and collate data on the effectiveness of SOPs during the events. Moreover, these events will be carried out in open spaces and physical distancing will be ensured.
• to waive the monthly tax repayment (CP204) until December 2021
• to include SIC members into the RM3000 one-off support under the Sports Operator Support package as announced by the Prime Minister in the latest PEMULIH packages
• to allow SIC members to apply for the RM600 wage subsidy under PEMULIH and to backdate to January 2021 as this industry has never been able to operate until to-date. SIC also pleaded to the government to extend this wave subsidy until December 2021
2) With the reopening of mass participation events, SIC proposes the following:
• Small scale events with a maximum of 500 pax and to gradually increase the numbers periodically.
• Outdoor events such as trail runs, mountain climbing and mountain biking should be allowed to operate with the proposed SOPs as these events are conducted in secluded areas without any crowd.
• Participants are required to have at least the 1st jab of any of the vaccines recognised by JKJAV.
• Event participants will be required to provide health status updates up to 5 days after the event to the race organiser. Race organiser to update the information to KBS.
• The mass participation event SOP recommendations remains as per submission in March 2021.
Based on the Mass Participation World (MPW) survey findings, taken in 29 countries with over 2.4million participations as of 25th June, there were only 2 recorded cases and no major clusters were found (link: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/chris-robb_theroadaheadmassparticipationworld-massparticipation-activity-6814121484546654208-XtfW/).
“The Sports Industry Coalition urges YB Dato' Sri Reezal Merican and the government to take immediate actions to save this industry from a total collapse. The imminent collapse of our businesses will be seen as the failure of the government to protect this industry in Malaysia,“ said Azman Fahmi, representative of the Sports Industry Coalition. - The Vibes. July 2, 2021
