by Lazarus Rokk
May 11
THE hardest decisions made by man must surely be the harshest ones, especially those that dictate the necessity to be cruel to be kind. We've all been there at one time or another.
Likewise for the Government, shutting down national sports associations will never be an easy decision to make even if it's opulently cushioned by an explicable sense of justice.
But when pragmatism demands the right judgement, the verdict must be swift, no matter how unkind it may appear.
And although we are far from being the Government's mouth-piece, in this respect I must however assign an "A" to Sports Minister Datuk Azalina Othman Said, and Sports Commissioner Tan Sri Elyas Omar for temporarily shutting down the Malaysian Taekwondo Association (MTA).
MTA were de-registered by Elyas last Friday.
But having made that conviction, there are however some mitigating factors that need to be considered in an exercise of this nature where the injured parties suffering the brunt of the blow would significantly be the sport and its innocent athletes.
This being the case, it would seem that the Sports Development Act that was applied in the de-registration of the national body, would need to be amended so that the ones who would be feeling the pain of such harsh decisions would centrally be the perpetrators.
In this respect, the ones who should be facing the wrath of the Act shouldn't be the association, but the administrators, in this case the general council.
The Act should allow the association to continue operating, but by an ad hoc committee that could either be appointed by the Ministry or the Olympic Council of Malaysia, until such time when matters have been resolved.
Even though Elyas had allowed for tournaments to go on as scheduled, one of the repercussions of the decision was the postponement of the national junior championships scheduled for May 27-29 at Kuala Terengganu.
Chairman of the de-registered MTA, Chin Mee Keong, claimed that following the turn of events, Terengganu Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Idris Jusoh had asked them to postpone the championships.
Whether or not Chin and his mates are seeking leverage against the Government from the postponement, perhaps the parties concerned should listen to the plea of a mother of a taekwondo exponent, who was representing a group of parents.
"We are not interested in the politics of the MTA, but we want the national junior championships to go on as scheduled.
"We have applied for leave, we have paid for flight tickets, made room reservations, but above all our children have been training so hard for the competition, so what's going to happen to all these now.
"Why must we all pay the price for someone else's mistake?"
TimeSport is not interested, nor involved in the politics either. What we would like to see is justice to be done, but the sport to go on.
We would like to see this national junior championships go on as scheduled in Kuala Terengganu, even if it has to be hosted by another body.
In this respect, I would like to suggest that the National Sports Council (NSC) step in as the new hosts for this meet, as a show of good faith by a body partly responsible for the de-registration.
The Government who are being partly held responsible by the parents and exponents alike for the postponement, would step out of this ring looking like champions if they can re-instate the "suspended" national junior championships.
Strike a blow for taekwondo, Ms Minister.
Source from http://www.nst.com.my
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