Taekwondo To Laos Introduce Poomsea

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 15 (Bernama) -- Though in the doldrums because of the absence of a sanctioned Sports Association (SA) to represent them, national taekwondo athletes will be relieved to know that the Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) will be sending a taekwondo contingent to the SEA Games in Laos this December.

OCM honorary-secretary Datuk Sieh Kok Chi said taekwondo was in fact included in the 21 sports out of the 25 on offer at the Games that Malaysia would be participating.

"Taekwondo will go to Laos under the sponsorship committee's ticket and I understand that the selection of the exponents for the Laos Games was already done in September," he said when contacted by Bernama here on Thursday.

Despite the Malaysian Taekwondo Association (MTA) being deregistered on May 6, 2005, national taekwondo athletes still had the opportunity to compete in the Manila SEA Games (2005), Korat SEA Games (2007) and the Beijing Olympic Games (2008) on the OCM ticket.

Presently all matters pertaining to the administration of the sport including participation in championships abroad is under the banner of the sponsorship committee chaired by OCM president Tan Sri Tunku Imran Tuanku Ja'afar with participation from the MTA, Malaysian Taekwondo Federation (MTF) and the Malaysian Taekwondo Clubs Association (MTCA).

Sieh said based on the initial list of names sent to him, there were 12 taekwondo athletes in the national contingent to Laos.

Meanwhile, former MTA vice president Nur Ekmal Bukhary said the taekwondo event in Laos would have a new event called Poomsae which offered four gold medals.

"Poomsae is like 'Kata' in Karate or or "silat seni" in the silat martial arts. Originally it was to be sparring event which offered 16 gold medals in Laos, but participating countries are only allowed 10 events," he said.

Coach N Kalanayigam said Poomsea was first introduced in the World Championship in Turkey last year and would be competed Laos as well as the Sukma Games in Melaka next year.

He said of the 12 exponents going to Laos, six athletes would compete in Poomsae under category B while the other six in the sparring event under category A.

Expenses for Category A athletes are fully borne by OCM while category B athletes are self-financing with the expenses only reimbursed if they win at least a silver medal.

Malaysia are taking part in aquatics, (swimming, diving, water polo), archery, athletics, badminton, snooker & billiards, boxing, cycling, football, golf, judo, karate, silat, taekwondo, petanque, sepaktakraw, shooting, table tennis, tennis, volleyball, weightlifting and wushu.

-- BERNAMA