Are we a nation content with staging only the SEA Games?

THE Kuala Lumpur Commonwealth Games in 1998, or KL’98, was a hallmark event symbolising Malaysia’s international graduation into newly industrialising nation status.

It was accomplished amidst an economic downturn, the haze and political turmoil.

I was fortunate enough to be in the thick of the action as a media personnel when KL’98 became a global media spectacle – covering the event from an organisational point of view and the behind-the-scenes strategies in terms of whipping the athletes into shape to justify the whopping financial outlay amounting to billions.

From the organisational perspective, covering Sukom Ninety Eight Berhad and its top management headed by Tan Sri Hashim Mohd Ali, aided by Chin Siew Foong, Rosly Selamat, Tunku Maziah Mukhtar and Datuk Nashatar Singh, to name a few, was a learning curve for me.

On top of moving from Stadium Negara to its new headquarters in Bukit Jalil in 1996, the National Sports Council (NSC) were taxed with the burden of producing a contingent to do justice as hosts, forcing the likes of Datuk Wira Mazlan Ahmad, Datuk Ho Koh Chye, Azizan Zainol Abidin, Zaki Abdul Rahman and M.P. Haridas to work closely with the National Sports Associations and government agencies and crack their heads strategically – including hiring naturalised athletes under the Jaya’98 programme.

At the Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM), Tan Sri Hamzah Abu Samah, Tunku Imran Tuanku Ja’afar, Datuk Alex Lee and Datuk Sieh Kok Chi were the driving force behind the bid document.

The costs of staging the Games in terms of hardware and software were considerable but the visual images of Malaysia being portrayed on millions of TV screens provided the audience a vivid perspective of Malaysia’s melting pot.

Now that the raging debate has ended as the Government has said no to the Commonwealth Games Federation (CGF) offer for Malaysia to stage the 2026 edition, what do we have to show in the foreseeable future under the present economic quaqmire we are in now?

Are we as a nation be content with organising the SEA Games, a biennial event featuring only 11 nations as opposed to more than 70 in the Commonwealth family?

As a leading nation in the region, Malaysia’s reputation as great organisers and gracious hosts was cast in stone long ago, with the successful staging of the SEAP Games in 1965 and 1971 and the rebranded SEA Games in 1977, 1989, 2001 and 2017.

Saying no to the 2026 edition means we missed the opportunity to provide a quantum leap to the existing group of athletes from squash, lawn bowls, tenpin bowling, weightlifting and powerlifting not only to deliver medals at home but also prepare ahead of the Aiichi Nagoya Asian Games in 2026, the 2027 SEA Games and the Los Angeles Olympics in 2028.

We missed the opportunity to boost the tourism sector with economic spillovers.

We missed the opportunity to mobilise the whole nation towards a common aim to create a national fervour, a national identity.

We missed the opportunity to train our human capital on volunteerism, hospitality, international diplomacy and technical requirements.

These are some of the intangible benefits that cannot be quantified in numbers.

It was indeed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity simply because Malaysia will not be paying for the sanction fees amounting to RM100mil, no cost for the bidding process and no new infrastructure was needed for a scaled down event based on the 2017 SEA Games organising model, with athletes billeted at the various hotels in Kuala Lumpur.

Drawing on the experience of the late Kok Chi, the doyen of Malaysian sports administration who mooted the idea of hosting KL’98, the bidding and hosting major sports events were becoming more complicated, bitterly competitive and expensive.

The Government only needed to top up the CGF grant of RM602mil to spruce up the existing infrastructure to prepare for both the Commonwealth Games and the SEA Games.

Mind you, Birmingham 2022 contributed £870.7mil (RM5.2bil) to the UK economy, with 9,000 full time equivalent jobs were supported thanks to the Games, with volunteers racking up 1.25 million hours of work, and the West Midlands were given new sports venues and improved transport services. Sure the Birmingham City Council current financial woes stemmed partly from hefty compensation claims it has had to pay former female employees.

But it is all water under the bridge. So let us change #TolakKomanwel to #SEAGames2027.