Sports Incentives: Yay or Nay?

Moderator :

Introduce the members of the floor.

Bismillahirahmanirrahim. Assalamualaikum everyone, and welcome the 2016

Economic Forum. First and foremost I would like to welcome the members of our
panel today. On my left, we have ______________, the Minister of Youth and Sports.
Next to her is one of Malaysia’s pride and joy, ______________ who represented us
in diving in the recent 2016, Olympic games. On my right we have,
________________________ the Minister of Finance, and next to her is the ever so
lovely, _______________________, Minister of Women, Family and Community
Development. Welcome everyone.

Now as we all know, during the recent 2016 Olympic games, the Government had
offered their athletes rewards in the form of cash, pension, as well as goods, such as
cars and what not. Now the hot question here is, why is this being done, and should it
be done? Therefore, I imagine, as the Minister of Youth and Sports, you would have a
somewhat clear idea and why these athletes deserve to be rewarded with such,
tremendous amount of cash? The floor is yours.

Minister of Youth & Sports :

Thank you, Dhabitah.

As the Minister of Youth and Sports, I would agree with rewarding the athletes with
with incentives. This sports incentive scheme called the (MAHAKAM) has been
established in the year 1986. That means this course of action is no longer something
new to us. For everybody’s information, this scheme is divided into 2 groups. First
would be Group A which involves big sporting events such as the Olympic games,
Commonwealth Sports, and the Southeast ASEAN Games, whereas in Group B are
tournaments like the Thomas Cup and the FIFA World Cup. To monitor this, we have
bodies like the National Sports Council (NSC) have been established to improve the
performance of out athletes in the international level, as well as individual
championships.

I believe that there are a lot of people who are questioning the Governments action in
rewarding the athletes with enormous amount of rewards. But you have to realize, that
we are not talking about high school level champions here. We are talking about the
rewarding the best on this face of earth for God’s sake. This to me, is definitely the
best compensation we can give to them for all the effort that they have put in, for
putting Malaysia back on the map.

Ladies and gentlemen, you have to remember, they did not become the athlete that
they are today overnight. Blood, sweat, tears and sometimes even their own money
had been invested to get to where they are now. They fully devoted their life to sports
and to compete while carrying the flag of Malaysia. What they are doing is nothing
less then to make us proud, and to me there is nothing, absolutely nothing wrong with
rewarding them the money that they clearly deserve.
Moderator :

Thank you, Dato’ for the great explaination on why these athletes deserve the rewards
that they are getting. I too agree, that you can’t become the world’s best overnight and
that the athlete must have put in tremendous amount of effort to get to where they are
now. Now moving on the panelists on my right side, I am petty sure they have their
say on what they think about this issue.

Now, I pass the floor to the Minister of Finance, to give us an insight to her thoughts
to this matter. Please.

Minister of Finance :

Thank you, Dhabitah. Well, first and foremost, I would like to congratulate all of the
athletes on their outstanding performance at the 2016 Rio Olympics. You have all
proved yourselves to be the cream of the crop. Unfortunately, as the Minister of
Finance, I have to point out that I have a few concerns regarding the issue of
rewarding the athletes. As we all know, our country right now is not exactly at it’s
best economic state. We recently had to cut off a lot of funding for a lot of our
country’s development. And this is because I feel that the money that we are
rewarding the athletes can be channeled to better sources. For example, paying the
government debts and maybe even give fundings on health researches to look for
cures for diseases like cancer, AIDS and etc.

Ladies and gentlemen, may I point out the the athletes in China, were taken away
from their family ever since they were toddlers to a camp where they were to be put
under vigourous sports training regimes. Unfortunately since we do not have the time
to show slides, I won’t be able to show you the faces of the children undergoing this
intensive training. Heartbreaking. But ladies and gentlemen, eventhough they go
through such pain and pressure, you should know that they are not being paid let
alone rewarded with cash by their Government.

This Ladies and gentlemen also brings up the issue of national pride. Where is out
athletes’ national pride? Are they performing solely to collect the reward that the
Government provide them. As a citizen of this country we have the right to know
where the tax money that we paid have gone to. Therefore, I feel this is unreasonable
as I feel a deteriorates the national pride in our local athletes.

However ladies and gentlemen, as the minister of finance, I do not 100% go against
the Government for paying the athletes. I, my opinion, we can reduce the amount of
money that we are rewarding the athletes today, so that we can use it for the
betterment of our country.
Moderator :

Thank you, Dato’ ____________________ for that very enlightning speech. I am sure
there are truth in what you say and I hope the people of Malaysia take into account
about the tax money that we pay, where the money goes to, and how the Government
spends it.

Now moving on to the next panelist. Whom we all have been waiting to hear speak o
her opinion on the Government’s actions on rewarding the athletes.

Athlete:

Thank you, Dhabitah.

(Laugh) Of course to me, as an athlete who has fought really hard for the country, I
am very happy that the Government even considers to reward us.

Well on my part, I certainly feel that we are not getting a lot of (SAMBUTAN) in the
field of sports in our country. We do have sport schools in our country. But if you see
the statistics the amount who would end up in sports at the end of the day will always
decrease.

So, in my opinion, with having rewards given to athletes, or better say, incentives, we
get to encourage the next generation to get into sports as it is definitely a rewarding
field just as any other fields in this country.

My friends and I have trained long and hard our whole lives for as long as we can
remember. The only difference between the athletes in China and us, is that we do not
get taken way from our families, and at the end of the day we get to go back home to
them. And we believe that we deserve the reward that th government is giving us for
the time and the effort that we have put into getting Malaysia on the map again.
Moderator :

I agree with what _______________ said, kids today are now torn between the
science and arts stream that they don’t even have time to enjoy sports like the people
in the olden days. What matters to the kids today are the amount of As they collect in
their exams.

Now, moving on to our next panelist, __________________________. I am sure she

has a lot of insightful thoughts on this matter. We would like to here your opinion
now. The floor is yours.

Social Welfare Officer :

Thank you, Dhabitah.

Moderator :

Well, that was a very brilliant response, thank you, ______________________. As

much as we would like to go on more about this issue, I’m afraid, we are out of time
and again I would like to thank our panelist present here today, the Minister of Youth
and Sports, _______________, diver athlete _________________, minister of
Finance,_____________ and finally, the social welfare officer, ________________ .
Thank you ladies and gentlemen for being with us from the beginning till the end of
our discussion today. I wish you all a pleasant morning. Assalamualaikum.