A national kayak athlete has alleged that the Singapore Canoe Federation (SCF) had been unfair for its selection for the upcoming Southeast Asian Games.
What is also damaging is that the issue has escalated such that lawyers have been brought into the picture to try and deal with the matter.
But the drama does not end there.
There have also been allegations of abuse and misconduct which have been filed with the Safe Sport Commission.
One of the complaints filed was that a national athlete who had been selected for the SEA Games had used abusive and vulgar language on another athlete during training.
TMSGOAL is not privy to the outcome by Safe Sport but it is understood that a response has since been provided to the complainant.
Queries were sent to the SCF’s General Manager Matthew Lee with SCF advisor and Minister of State Alvin Tan in copy.
There was no response to the queries..
VULGAR LANGUAGE AND SAFE SPORT
On 25 October, a formal complaint was filed with Safe Sport by an athlete against another team-mate.
According to sources close to TMSGOAL, the complaint alleged that there was verbal abuse which was of threatening in nature, which also was degrading and which appeared to ridicule in public.
The incident allegedly happened at the Marina Reservoir near the Benjamin Sheares Bridge.
The complaint alleges that a national athlete shouted “Oi K2, F*ck off to the other side lah!” In an aggressive manner which has created a “toxic training environment”.
It is unclear if the complaint has been dealt with yet or what has been the SCF’s response to the complaint filed.
SEA GAMES SELECTION QUESTION MARKS
The SCF’s selection for the upcoming SEA Games has also been questioned with one athlete seeking legal assistance to query the SCF’s selection.
TMSGOAL will not name the athlete concerned and will refer to him as Athlete A.
According to details made known to TMSGOAL, the SCF allegedly conducted preliminary selections for the team boat event, but Athlete A was not made aware of such tryouts and hence was deprived of the opportunity to participate.
In addition, a selection race held on 11 April for K1-200m to determine the athletes to form the team pool for SEA Games 2025 also ended up with results being disputed.
Athlete A filed a protest that other athletes had made false starts.
And even though he had achieved the qualifying timing benchmark, he was told that his qualifying time was very close to the benchmark, which was inexplicable.
And while the results for the said race was still not released, the SCF then announced another internal time trial to shortlist athletes for the MK4-200m team for the SEA Canoe Championships but left out Athlete A.
When queried, Athlete A was allegedly informed that he had not been selected for the team boat pool and hence was not able to take part in the time trial.
TMSGOAL reiterates that queries were sent to the SCF General Manager Matthew Lee and no responses were received over the questions posed.
MAIN PHOTO: SCF
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