KUALA LUMPUR – Finances for the sports sector must be allocated in Budget 2023 if Malaysia wants to win an Olympic gold medal, Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) secretary-general Datuk Mohammad Nazifuddin Mohammad Najib said.
The budget, to be tabled next Friday, must target athletes’ development for the 2024 Paris Olympics, he said today at a post-mortem and appreciation event for Malaysia’s performance at the Hanoi SEA Games.
“I hope the Youth and Sports Ministry can allocate an appropriate budget… we need sufficient financial backing for all the sports that we target to participate in at the games. We have to prepare for the Paris Olympics and also for the 2028 edition in Los Angeles,” he said.
Nazifuddin said the biggest portion of funds would go towards sending athletes for more tournaments abroad that will give them the qualification points needed to participate at the Olympics.
“We know that our favourites for gold would be in badminton, diving, and cycling. But we also want to send more athletes to other events to increase our chances for gold.
“To do this, we need more budget allocation to send athletes for international competitions so they can obtain the qualification points needed to be in the Olympics,” Nazifuddin said.
Nazifuddin also hinted that the national contingent is unlikely to replicate the 39-gold-medal performance in Hanoi during next year’s SEA Games in Cambodia as many sports that have become Malaysia’s target events will not be contested.
“Cambodia as hosts, have added many traditional sports that Malaysia does not participate in such as bokator, Cambodian chess (makruk), and wrestling.
“We don’t focus on these sports so we have to accept the reality that we cannot win as many gold medals as we did in Vietnam.
“We will have a selection process on October 11. Even though we might be sending a smaller contingent, the important thing is to make sure they have a good impact on medal collection,” he added.
At the post-mortem today, Malaysia’s chef de mission at the Hanoi SEA Games, Datuk Nur Azmi Ahmad, said several issues were noted so as to avoid a recurrence when the 2023 edition of the games are held in Cambodia.
Some of these issues involve transportation and meal preparation, according to complaints received from team managers, he said.
“This is also the time for us to improve our position from being below Singapore on the SEA Games medal tally because there is no reason we cannot achieve better results as we have been preparing since the Commonwealth Games and Malaysia Games,” Nur Azmi added.
Malaysia won 39 gold medals in Hanoi, three more than the target of 36, but was in sixth place behind Singapore, who claimed 47 golds. – The Vibes, October 1, 2022
