SEA Games 2025: M'sia to submit appeal after exclusion of karate, wushu

The Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) will submit an appeal to the Southeast Asian Games Federation (SEAGF) over the exclusion of several medal prospect sports for the country in the 2025 SEA Games in Thailand.

Thailand during the recent SEAGF Sports and Rules Committee meeting held in Bangkok, had proposed a 40-sports programme, together with flying disc and tug of war as demonstration sports for the 33rd SEA Games scheduled from Dec 9-20 next year in Bangkok, Chonburi and Songkhla.

Surprisingly, karate and wushu - the country’s two gold mine sports - as well as jujitsu, lawn bowls and Olympics staple weightlifting were excluded from the list.

OCM president Mohamad Norza Zakaria said the umbrella body is in the process of compiling feedback from the respective national sports associations (NSA) to submit the appeal before the Aug 31 deadline.

“Under the SEAGF Charter and Rules, every host country is entitled to propose a list of preliminary sports from various categories after discussion with their government. This is subject to the final approval by the SEAGF Council after considering the appeals of other countries.

“Firstly, the local NSA must lobby, and the sport must represent the majority of the 11 competing countries, with each event having a minimum participation of four countries.

“This is a process that everyone will follow, where the final list must be confirmed at least 15 months before the opening ceremony, which is around Sept 9 this year,” he told reporters.

He had earlier officiated the World Taekwondo Kyorugi and Poomsae International Referee Seminar and Refresher Course at Wisma OCM in Kuala Lumpur today.

On the exclusion of weightlifting, Norza said it is due to doping violations in the host country.

However, he said with many countries wanting the popular Olympic sport to be held, he hopes the appeal will be received positively.

Falling short

OCM in a statement announced that Norza has been appointed as the second vice-chairperson of the SEAGF Executive Committee during the same meeting.

“It is in accordance with Article 11.3 of the SEAGF Charter and Rules and by virtue of Malaysia being the next host of the SEA Games, the 34th edition in 2027,” the statement read.

At the 2023 Cambodian SEA Games, the national contingent faced its worst-ever outing by finishing seventh with 34 gold, 45 silver and 97 bronze, falling short of the 40-gold target.

Karate contributed four gold medals, two silver and four bronze, and wushu delivered two golds, two silvers and six bronzes, while weightlifting and jujitsu bagged one bronze each.

Lawn bowls, another strong prospect for Malaysia, last featured at the 2019 SEA Games, when the national squad swept four gold and two bronze from six events contested.

The proposed list of sports for SEA Games 2025:

Category I A (Compulsory Sports): Aquatics and athletics.

Category I B (Compulsory and Olympic Sports): Archery, badminton, basketball, canoe and rowing, cycling, equestrian and polo, fencing, football and futsal, golf, gymnastics, handball, hockey, judo, rugby, sailing, shooting, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, triathlon, volleyball, wrestling, ice skating, ice hockey and modern pentathlon.

Category II (Sports in the Olympics and Asian Games): Baseball and softball, billiards and snooker, boxing, floorball, e-sports, muay, netball, pencak silat, petanque, sepak takraw and chinlone and squash.

Category III (Other Sports): Teqball and kickboxing.

Demonstration Sports: Flying disc and tug of war.

- Bernama

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