TUNKU IMRAN ON THE WAY FORWARD FOR MALAYSIAN SPORTS

BY Azman Ujang

KUALA LUMPUR, May 4 (Bernama) -- The way forward to establish a sports culture
in Malaysia is for better coordination among the various ministries and a
political will that has to come from the prime minister, according to the
country's top sports official.

Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) president Tunku Imran Tuanku Ja'afar said
all ministries should take the lead from the sports people, the
Youth and Sports Ministry and the sports councils in order to have much better
coordinated efforts to develop sports.

"I think there has to be a political will for this and I think it has to
come from the prime minister, because sports is such a cross-ministerial thing
that you need the PM to actually direct that it should happen," he told Bernama
in an interview.

Tunku Imran said he was very much encouraged by the views expressed by
newly-appointed Youth and Sports Minister Ahmad Shabery Cheek on the
directions he wants to take Malaysan sports.

"I like what he says. No. 1, he says let's establish a sports culture, No.
2, we need that elusive Olympic gold medal and we are going to go for it and No.
3, sports has become a business and an industry whereby there's greater
opportunities for players, coaches and people generally to earn money and make a
living.

"What needs to happen also is to give time within the school curriculum for
sports and one hour a week is certainly not enough and there has to be a major
rethinking about this," Tunku Imran said.

He pointed out that realistically, 90 per cent of schoolchildren were
playing sports just for essentially health and exercise reasons and only 10 per
cent could be expected to advance to do elite sports either for national,
regional or international competitions.

Sports, in his view, has to be a two-pronged effort -- firstly to have the
mass that is playing sports or is interested in sports and feels that sports is
actually fun and secondly, to identify those who want to do elite sports or
those whose parents want their children to do such sports.

Tunku Imran said every school should have a sports club which basically
addressed the elite athletes and to assist them to really be more active in
sports and to strive to get to higher levels.

"Those sports clubs should be active on weekends like Saturday mornings or
afternoons and utilise the school facilities for that. If you drive around on
Saturdays, our school facilities are completely closed...they have beautiful
fields with nothing going on and that's almost a crime," he said.

He suggested that all schools be given resources like at least a coach and
equipment which was not necessarily expensive and at least one or two masters to
organise sports in a planned and professional manner.

"Obviously if the school has only one coach, he or she is going to be
stretched. There should be provision for part-time coaches, part-time referees
and others.

"Every sports association in the country, whether it's district, state or
national, has people who just need to be asked and they will do it because they
have this passion for sports," Tunku Imran said.

The part-timers could be utilised to assist school sports clubs and those
elite
players during weekends while schools should get together and form leagues, he
said.

Also, the 10 per cent of sports talents who made the grade for elite sports
must be given competitions on a weekly basis during off-examination periods by
having inter-school leagues such as for Forms 1 and 2, Forms 3 and 4 and Forms 5
and 6.

Tunku Imran also stressed the important role of parents in discovering
sports talents.

"I'm sure parents would only be too happy to drive their kids to school or
to another school if it's an away match...they'll stay with the
kids. I think we never bring in the parents enough into this.

"In America and Australia the parents are the ones that almost become the
driver, the referee, the coach and everything.

"So I think there are so many volunteers and most of them are parents who
would be very happy to be with their kids on a Saturday morning or to drop off
their kids and pick them up later and I think this is what is not happening and
that a very sad thing in this country."

Tunku Imran said "coordination is everything" and the Youth and Sports
Ministry had to take the lead in sports in schools, universities and areas under
the local authorities.

Asked how the country's sports talents had been unearthed, the veteran
sports administrator said the biggest source was actually the parents.

" If you look at every single champion that we have produced, the parental
influence is huge. Nicol David (squash) , the Sidek brothers (badminton). They
have to start somewhere, and in squash which is a good example, you can
produce a world champion without or in spite of the school system," he said.

Describing Nicol, the reigning world squash champion, as a classic example,
Tunku Imran, himself a former national squash champion, said she as well as
fellow players Ong Beng Hee and Azlan Iskandar did not learn squash in school.

"They learnt squash because their parents introduced them to the game and
they were playing in club or public courts and that's how in some individual
sports it can happen. This also happens in martial arts like taekwondo and
karate where our athletes get to the Olympics because their parents put them
into academy or club and if they are determined enough they can actually become
champion without the school system.

Reiterating the importance of coordination, Tunku Imran said: "The Ministry
of Youth and Sports has got to be invited by the Ministry of Education to assist
them in establishing sports in schools.

"If not, there's no coordination. It's so important that if you are going to
spend a lot of money trying to build champions by the Youth and Sports Ministry,
then they must know that the material they are getting is of certain a
standard...if the material is not good, they are not going to be able to be
champions," he said.

-- BERNAMA