Alex Lee Trophy to beef up fund

28/05/2003

THE Olympic Council of Malaysia (OCM) will be holding the inaugural Tan
Sri Alex Lee Trophy at the Saujana Golf and Country Club on June 25.
The objective of the event is to raise funds for the Tan Sri Alex Lee
Athletes Education Fund which went into a semi-frozen state after its
launch in 1999.
Lee, who died in a scuba diving accident off the coast of Papua New
Guinea on Oct 31, 1999, held the post of vice-president in the OCM and was
president of the Squash Rackets Association of Malaysia - and a host of
other positions.
"The Alex Lee Athletes Education fund now stands at RM270,000 which was
collected from well-wishers, the Commonwealth Games Federation and the
OCM. But for the past five years, we have not been taking care of the fund
because of other numerous responsibilities.
"But now we (OCM) have decided to form a separate committee to take care
of the fund and we would like to start by holding this annual challenge
trophy to remember his immense contributions to sports and also collect
more money to sustain the education fund," said OCM secretary Datuk Sieh
Kok Chi yesterday.
The fund has helped five needy athletes to date, with cyclist M.
Kumaresan being one of them.
"We have set overselves a target of RM500,000 so that the revenue
gathered could provide at least four annual grants of RM12,000 each to
needy present and former national athletes to further their studies," said
Sieh.
Malaysian Golf Association president Thomas Lee was choked with emotion
when asked to speak about his brother's fund.
"As the senior vice-president of the OCM, he had contributed much
towards the development of sports in the country and I am sure he would
appreciate his name being used to collect money for an education fund for
athletes, a topic which was always close to his heart," said Thomas.
The inaugural trophy will be held at the Bunga Raya Course and the
format will be team stroke-play competition.
The entrance fee is RM1,200 per team (four golfers) and all competitors'
handicaps will be subject to a 25 per-cent reduction. Non-golfers can join
the lunch for a fee of RM100.
For more information, call OCM at 03-20787648.
(END)