Preserving the integrity of sports

Olympic founder Baron Pierre de Coubertin once said, “it’s not the winning but the struggle.” The beauty of sports is in the competition. Winning at all costs contradicts the essence of participation. It is deplorable that in the modern era, the integrity of sports is widely compromised by officials who play politics, prioritize commercialism over love of the game and tolerate cheating through doping, recruitment of ineligible athletes and manipulation of rules.

The Southeast Asian (SEA) Games is a sad example of an international sporting event going down the drain. Instead of fostering the Olympic spirit, hosts of the biennial 11-nation conclave tinker with the rules to suit their selfish interests. It appears that the challenge is for every host to be creative in configuring the calendar of events to deliver the overall championship, regardless of Olympic norms and sporting ethics.

Surely, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has influence over the SEA Games Federation as the supervisor of the event. If SEA Games hosts continue to run the event like a backyard activity with loaded dice, the spirit of wholesome competition loses its significance. Whenever a country takes a turn to host, expect manipulation and bending of rules to put one over the others.

It’s no surprise that in four of the last SEA Games, hosts have won the overall championship – Vietnam when Hanoi hosted in 2003, the Philippines when Manila hosted in 2005, Thailand when Nakhon Ratchasima hosted in 2007 and Indonesia when Jakarta and Palembang hosted in 2011. The exception was Laos when Vientiane hosted in 2009. Since the SEA Games welcomed the Philippines, Indonesia and Brunei in 1977, host countries have captured 10 of 18 overall championships. That’s an extremely high rate considering Singapore hosted in 1983 and 1993, Brunei hosted in 1999 and Laos hosted in 2011. 

Indonesia has won the overall title in the four SEA Games it hosted in 1979, 1987, 1997 and 2011. Thailand also took the overall championship in the three SEA Games it hosted in 1985, 1995 and 2007. The Philippines is no exception as its highest finishes c…ame when Manila hosted in 1981 (third place with 55 gold medals behind Indonesia’s 85 and Thailand’s 62), 1991 (second place with 92 gold medals behind Indonesia’s 90) and 2005 (first place with 113 gold medals). The only SEA Games championship that the Philippines won came when Manila hosted in 2005. Arnis, a Filipino martial art, was played in only two SEA Games, both when Manila hosted in 1991 and 2005. 

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At the 2011 SEA Games, Indonesia introduced several sports in the calendar. Vovinam, wall-climbing, water skiing, rollersport and kempo brought in 35 gold medals for the host country which finished with 144 of 376 gold medals at stake in 41 sports. Indonesia excluded Olympic sport triathlon, squash (played in eight previous SEA Games), lawn bowls, bodybuilding, muay and dancesport among others because its chances of winning gold in those events were slim. With imaginative tinkering, Indonesia snatched 40 percent of the gold medals on the line.

In this year’s SEA Games, Myanmar is following the example of previous hosts. The calendar of sports has been reduced to 33 but there will be 460 gold medals at stake, more than in Indonesia two years ago. Myanmar officials are targeting a haul of 100 gold medals, an incredible goal considering the country produced only 16 for seventh place in 2011. You can just imagine the manipulation that will be done to bring Myanmar to its lofty target. The Philippines claimed 36 gold medals for sixth place but its outlook is bleak this year because Myanmar has eliminated over 30 events where it has potential top finishes.

Myanmar has struck out Olympic sports beach volleyball, gymnastics and tennis to accommodate an indigenous game called chinlone (similar to speak takraw without a net), petanque, vovinam and kempo.  How the Philippines will end up in the medal standings is now a cause for concern.

But more than worrying about the Philippines’ fate in the coming SEA Games, we should be concerned about the future of the event itself. How much longer will the IOC tolerate this crass denigration of sports? Manipulating the calendar of sports has become a sick joke and sets an atrocious example for athletes. For instance, how do you think tennis players feel about being disenfranchised in Myanmar? Why are they not allowed to compete when athletes in vovinam and chinlone are given the green light to perform? Whatever happened to the Baron’s vision? 

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Commercialism has a lot to do with tarnishing the Olympic spirit. In the book “The Secret Olympian,” it was mentioned that “the conflict between the high ideals of the Olympic spirit and the crude pressures of commercialism and rivalry to succeed have always been present while the worldwide TV and media coverage of the Games pipes the regular controversies into living rooms globally, the Games can also be used as a platform to point to even greater human evils…Governments clumsily wield Olympic boycotts, to the detriment of their athletes, to make political statements but it is the conduct of individual competitors that we remember.” To be sure, it is the athletes who, at the end of the day, will preserve what is left of the integrity of sports. 

The challenge before the SEA Games Federation is to bring sanity back to the event. There should be a standard set of sports to be played in every SEA Games with Olympic disciplines given due priority. Indigenous sports may be added to the calendar on an exhibition or demonstration basis. If a country is unable to stage the standard set of sports, then it loses the opportunity to host. A country that has no facilities to stage certain sports may enlist the assistance of other countries as a partner or provide the resources in order to qualify as a host. Steps must be done now to save the SEA Games from becoming the laughing stock of international sports.