KUCHING: Both the State Stadium and Sarawak Stadium will be used simultaneously to host a total of some 7,000 athletes and delegates coming for the 21st Asia Masters Athletics Championship (AMAC) 2019, here.
The AMAC, especially attracts the Masters category athletes who are between 35 and 100 years of age besides the 1,500 events to make it necessary to use of both stadiums at the same time.
Sarawak Sports Corporation (SSC) which manages all sports facilities owned by the state will be the lead agency in handling the venues for the event.
SSC will also be working in collaboration with the Malaysian Athletes Federation (MAF) and the Malaysian Masters Athletes Association (MMAA) to handle the logistics for the event which be held here from Dec 2 to 6.
According to its CEO Dr Ong Kong Swee, in terms of logistics and venue, the corporation is ready for the event as it had already made plans for the hosting of the IPC and this event was to be the second largest event after the IPC this year.
“SSC will have its hands full with the venue requirements and the needs of the international press corps, but we are confident of meeting all the requirements in time for the event in December,” added Dr Ong.
Following representations made by the Sarawakian delegation which were led by Assistant Minister of Youth and Sports, Datuk Snowdan Lawan in close cooperation with MMAA, 23 out of 25 Asia Masters Athletics (AMA) delegates voted for Kuching as the host city for 2019 at a meeting held in Rugao City, China in September 2017.
Snowdan said MMAA will take charge of all the technical aspects of the championship and the association has assured him that applications and reservations by visiting athletes and support teams will be open online by May 1 this year.
“We will have actual figures of the participation by September and we are expecting between 45 to 50 countries to send their teams with 3,500 athletes competing in all the categories,” said Snowdan.
The MMAA patron, Datuk Seri (Dr) V Pulainthiran said: “We have impressed upon the delegates in Rugao on Kuching’s readiness in terms of available facilities and also among the points of consideration such as the readily available medical facilities and support given by SSC and the Sarawak government.”
While organising committee member and president of MAF, Datuk Karim Bin Ibrahim have some reservations on the issue of connectivity, he was optimistic that the problem can be quickly resolved by working closely with all airlines and they may even enlist assistance from the Royal Malaysian Airforce should the need arise.
“Sarawak is becoming increasingly more accessible, especially from the Asia region so we will expect big delegations from China, Japan and India to come here and we hope to have 600 athletes from Malaysia as well,”said Karim.
Among the notable local Masters category athletes expected to compete are the ‘Flying Dayak’ Watson Nyambek and Tupong Assemblyman Fazruddin Abdul Rahman.
