Hishammuddin: Follow guidelines, laws

09/05/2002

SPORTS Minister Datuk Hishammuddin Hussein Onn, has only one advice for
the Malaysian Hockey Federation (MHF) - follow the guidelines and laws
provided for the smooth running of organisations and put their house in
order.
"I do not see a big problem in the MHF today because they have a pool of
good hockey players. But they need to run the organisation according to
the laws set by their constitution," said Hishammuddin after chairing the
Post Cabinet meeting yesterday.
MHF vice president Datuk Abuld Jalil Abdul Majid has come out and said
that there has not been a single council meeting for the past three years
and also the competitions committee, of which Jalil is the chairman, has
not held a meeting since September 2000 despite him providing dates for
it.
The MHF BGM is also overdue because the last elections were held on Dec
12 1999, which means that elections should have been held at the end of
last year but to date, nothing has been done to rectify the situation.
"We discussed it at the Post Cabinet and the Sports Commissioner (Datuk
Mahamad Zabri Min) has had a meeting with the MHF and has told them to set
the record straight.
"From my point of view, the situation in the MHF is not too bad, only
they have to put their house in order and then everything will be fine.
And it is not true for people to consrtrue that the situation in MHF is as
bad as that in the Malaysian AAU.
"These are two sets of different problems which need to be tackled with
a different approach," said Hishammuddin.
The MHF sub committees have not been functioning well and some quarters
have come out to say that even their schools committe, chaired by Datuk
Abdul Manap Ibrahim, has not held a meeting since it was formed in 1999.
When asked what will be the next course of action if MHF fails to get
its house in order, he said: "MHF should rectify their administritive
weaknesses ... but if they still choose not to follow the rules set by
their constitution, it becomes a different matter alltogether.
"And I am not willing to speculate on what kind of action that can be
taken if the situation is not rectified fast," said Hishammuddin.
The state HA's have come out strongly to say that the MHF have not been
giving them much support to popularise the sport at the grassroots and
since they could not source for sponsors, running domestic leagues has
become a distant dream.
Penang HA, Terengganu HA, Kelantan HA, Perak HA, Kuala Lumpur HA, Negri
HA and Johor HA have come out in to open to criticise the way things are
being run in the MHF and have blamed certain quarters for not following
the proper procederes when dealing with the running of their competitions
and their sub-committees.
A senior council member of the MHF, who declined to be named, confirmed
that no competitions comittee meeting was held before organising the
ongoing Malaysia Hockey League (MHL) and calling for the Junior Hockey
League entries. MHF also awarded the Under-15 tournament to Terengganu
without the knowledge of the chairman.
(END)