IS THE SEA GAMES LOSING ITS GLAMOUR?

By Zulhilmi Supaat

KUALA LUMPUR, March 5 (Bernama) -- The SEA Games, into its 25th edition, may
have lost its allure, following the emergence of a number of new major events in
the region and the fact that SEA Games host, Laos, are unable to offer the usual
number of sports or medals.

Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) secretary Sieh Kok Chi agreed that though
the introduction of new events was a good move to expose young athletes, it has
more or less eroded the attention and importance of the SEA Games to a certain
degree.

However, though some of the events are being organised for the first time
and sanctioned or endorsed by the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA), organising such
events has given room for speculation as to its real objective - whether
organised to make profits or just to fill the Asian calendar of events.

Kok Chi said with so many events on the calendar, the OCM are also in a bind
and has to pick and choose events to determine whether such championships were
beneficial or not.

From January to December, there are a total of eight major championships for
OCM to participate.

Among them are the 5th Australian Youth Olympics Festival (Jan 14-18), 1st
Asian Martial Arts Games, Bangkok (April 25-May 3), Arafura Games, Darwin,
Australia (May 9-17), 1st Asian Youth Games, Singapore (June 29-July 7), World
Games, Taiwan (July 16-26), 2nd Islamic Solidarity Games, Iran (Oct 15-26), 3rd
Asian Indoor Games, Hanoi (Oct 30-Nov 8) and the Laos SEA Games (Dec 9-18).

Publicity for such events as against the SEA Games, has also robbed the
glamour for the biggest multi-sport event in ASEAN.

According to Kok Chi, he had raised his concern over the growing number of
events organised without a clear indication of its objective, at a forum
recently, but had received negative response as some countries felt it was a
quick way of making some profits.

He cited the 1st Asian Beach Games in Bali, Indonesia from Oct 18-26 last
year which suffered heavy loses although it was aimed at making profit.

"Though the Asian Beach Games was sanctioned by OCA, the cost of hosting the
event was borne by the host and since beach sports was not popular in the
region, the host suffered loses," he said.

Kok Chi said he would again raise the matter at the OCA Congress in Kuwait
(March 13-14) so that the OCA can evaluate the introduction of such events.

As for Malaysia, the OCM would only decide to compete in events that offered
maximum benefits to athletes and of all the eight events on the OCM calendar,
priority would still be the SEA Games, he said.

He added that priority number two would be the Youth Olympics, Asian Youth
Commonwealth Games and Asian Youth Games while the Asian Indoor, Asian Martial
Arts Games and Islamic Solidarity Games are third in line on the priority list
and associations need to source for their own funds from sponsors to compete.

"The current economic crisis will restrict sponsors from coming forward to
support, as such OCM too need to be selective in providing assistance to
associations or athletes who wished to compete in the eight events," he said.

Laos, the poorest country in ASEAN, are also suffering from the crisis and
do not have enough resources to go on a massive publicity campaign for the Games
and money was also the reason for the host to reduce the number of sports from
43 in Korat, Thailand in 2007, to 25 this year.

The host would be depending heavily on the RM300 million (US$80.8
million)financial aid offered by China, Vietnam and Thailand, to build
infrastructure and host the Games, he said.
-- BERNAMA