Safe Sports Malaysia president Sarina Sundara Raj has questioned the decision of Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh to rely on implementing a code instead of a full bill.
Yeoh today decided against tabling the Safe Sport Bill but pledged to enshrine its provisions in a code that could be implemented as soon as March.
“Malaysia needs to be more serious about safe sports. But unfortunately, the government's effort to address abuse in sports has amounted to little more than a facade.
“While there has been a welcome growth for the proposed Safe Sport Act last year, the new law designed to make sports safer is now discontinued in the renewed push.
“Yeoh’s decision to drop this course of action shows that athletes’ safety and well-being are not top priorities,” Sarina told Malaysiakini.
She said there continues to be resistance to safe sports initiatives, with many efforts hindered or defeated by those who benefit from the system, and even successful efforts have been rolled back.
“Moreover, these struggles have been further faced with additional challenges for access and inclusion by those excluded.
“The Act is a legal oversight. The code is administrative oversight. The centre is independent oversight. We will need to implement all three to drive systemic change, but now the Act and the centre are being dropped,” Sarina added.
Lengthy process
In announcing the move today, Yeoh said she had factored in the often-lengthy legislative process, which might complicate the ministry’s bid to make the sporting system safer for athletes.
“I’ve just decided that we would go with a code simply because we have existing legislation and I don’t want to confuse our stakeholders, I don’t want to delay having to address safe sports.
“Just because to have a legislation there are so many rounds you have to go through before it is actually tabled in Parliament and that’s something I don’t think we have time for,” Yeoh was quoted as saying by the Malay Mail.
She pointed out that when Malaysia first spoke about the Safe Sport Act, the Anti-Sexual Harassment Act was not yet tabled in Parliament.
“Now that we already have the Act do we need to come up with a new law to deal with sexual harassment that happens at the badminton court, for example?
“So, now we have these existing laws, let’s give these laws a chance. We use that first and then we look at weaknesses and maybe improve from there.
“I feel that we have the Penal Code, then we have the Employment Act; so, imagine a coach that is accused of sexual harassment, we’d also have the Anti-Sexual Harassment Act so there are so many and I don’t want it to be confusing,” she added.
Last year, then-minister Ahmad Faizal Azumu said the Youth and Sports Ministry was working on laws to ensure the safety of athletes, and that officers have been tasked to work on developing a Safe Sport Act.
In January, Sarina told Malaysiakini she believed the Safe Sport Act was needed to impose safeguards in sports organisations, expand mandatory reporting of suspected abuse, include mandatory prevention training, and provide whistleblower protection to prevent retaliation.
She said it was very important the safety of athletes not be swept aside and that it be treated separately from just issues that fall under the Sexual Harassment Act. - Mkini
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