Malaysian sports teams

Press, Volume CXIII, Issue 33261, 26 June 1973, Page 14

Malaysian sports teams

Sir, —Mr Elderton is too stubborn about his self-im-posed views. Does he not take any notice of the letters written in by Malaysians? We feel we are better judges than he. His letters show that he is either biased or has limited knowledge about Malaysia, as for instance, in his constant usage of "Malaya” instead of “Malaysia.” For his information sports teams were all selected on a merit basis. In fact the majority of badminton players are nonMalay. The 1974 Commonwealth Games will be a great opportunity to put Mr Elderton’s assertions to the test. If he is proved wrong I hope he will be man enough to admit it.—Yours, etc., ANNOYED NON-MALAY MALAYSIAN. June 25, 1973.

Sir,—ln 1968, ’69 and ’7O the Malaysians honoured Ng Boon Bee (badminton), Gunalan (badminton) and Ng Joo Ngan (cycling) with “Sportsman of the Year” awards. The “Sportswoman of the Year” award for 1968, ’69 and ’7O went to Gon Koon f » (basketball), Ong Mei Lin (swimming) and Radhika Menon (tennis) respectively. All six were non-Malays. At the fifth South-East Asian shooting meet at Djakarta last year Malaysia was represented by Mui Sam Loong, Goh Tai Yong, Tengku Abu Bakar and Chan Kok Leong. All except Tengku were nonMalays. At Munich, Malaysian athletes were Krishnan, Payadesa, Sivaram, Zainuddin, Sabapathy, Gladys Chai, Junaida, Hassan and Istiag.

Will Mr Elderton please identify the Malay and nonMalay athletes? —Yours etc., MALAYSIAN. June 23, 1973.

Sir,—l have already given a number of examples of racial discrimination in Maiaya against Malaysians; here are some more. Why does the Constitution lay down a percentage of jobs/ appointments which must be held by Malays, but there is nothing vice versa. Europeans may not have jobs which can be held by Malays. The overwhelming number of Malaysians who have been trained as “pilots’ 1 in this country are Malays, and not non-Malays. Why were there no Europeans in the Malaysian hockey squad? There are several well up to standard. If the Springboks have to have non-whites in a team representing the whites, why do not the Malaysians have to have whites in a team representing the nonwhite Malaysians? This is discrimination! —Yours, etc., A. C. R. ELDERTON.

June 25, 1973. [This correspondence is now closed.—Editor, “The Press.”]