School tennis players self-finance participation in state, national events
SANDAKAN: Sandakan Indian Association president Taren Sunil Manoharan yesterday expressed his disappointment that the Education Ministry does not seem to have allocated enough funds to promote sports among schoolchildren.
He said this was brought to his attention by parents of some of the affected kids.
Taren cited the case where parents of junior tennis players had to self-finance their children to take part in the state-level Sabah School Sports Council (MSSS) Tennis Tournament held in Kota Kinabalu recently.
It was a similar story for those selected to represent Sabah at the national-level Malaysia School Sports Council (MSSM) Tennis Tournament in Kuala Lumpur.
“It was really sad to learn that the local District Education Office did not have funds to send their district's school players to take part in a state-level tennis tournament. I understand that even the officials and teachers who led the team had to come up with their own money,” he said.
Taren urged that enough funds be allocated to the respective district education offices to send students to take part in state-level sports events.
“The same thing happened when the selected junior tennis players were sent to Kuala Lumpur for the national-level MSSM event. Parents were again asked to fully fund the cost of their children's trip. This should not be happening,” he said.
“Naturally, parents are always eager to see their kids participate in more tournaments so that they will improve at the game or sport in which they are involved.
“The parents of the tennis playing kids voluntarily paid for their expenses to take part in the Sabah-level MSSS tournament. After that, they again financed their kids to Kuala Lumpur for the national level games,” Taren said.
He said that while the better-off parents were able to pay for the expenses of their kids, there might be others who could not afford to do so, thus depriving their talented kids the opportunity to prove themselves.
“The authorities concerned must do something about this. It is not right for them to ‘wash their hands' off such matters,” he said.
“The way for sports and games to progress is to create a large pool of young players at the grassroots level which obviously will come from schools.
“It is therefore quite distressing that even at this critical level of sports development, funds are not forthcoming,” he added.
Taren stressed that neither he nor other parents were trying to make a big issue out of the matter but it was just not right to leave talented sports kids fending for themselves.
“It adversely affects sports development at the school level and will have a ripple effect on overall sports development,” he said.
He urged those in authority to seriously look into the matter for the sake of sports in the state and country.
“Please allocate enough funds to develop sports at the school level,” he appealed.