Sports initiatives to benefit youth

EARLY PROMISE: Their development vital in helping country achieve developed nation status by 2020, says minister

YOUTHS form the core of every nation as vital human capital is essential to the continuous development of its society and economy.

Recognising youth development as an important key in helping the country achieve a developed nation status by 2020 as well as being a high-income economy, several key targets were set for the Youth and Sports Ministry under the Ministerial Key Results Area (MKRA) initiative of the Government Transformation Programme (GTP).

Within the purview of the Youth and Sports Ministry are programmes and initiatives aimed at ultimately engaging our youth in healthy, educational and nation-building exercises, which will develop them into intelligent, mature and responsible adults in the future.

Youth and Sports Minister, Datuk Seri Ahmad Shabery Cheek, strongly believes that youth are the catalyst of Malaysia’s transformation towards a high-income developed nation by 2020.

“Youths are at the heart of national programmes like the GTP, the Economic Transformation Programme (ETP) and the New Economic Model (NEM). With the creation of 3.3 million jobs as the end game of these transformation programmes, our youth will form part of the future labour market and intellectual capital of the nation,” he said.

The establishment of MKRAs itself is a transformational change in the way government delivery is performed.

It is a more transparent and engaging process, one that focuses on ministerial responsibility and delivery.

The MKRA and its attendant Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) is about identifying priorities and setting targets for individual ministers and their ministries.

In this regard, the youth and sports minister had a range of initiatives which he had to deliver in 2011 to uphold his duties and obligations to the rakyat.

One of the key initiatives under the Youth and Sports Ministry’s MKRA was the celebration of the 2011 National Youth Day.

A target of one million visitors for the celebration was given to the minister. As it turns out, this target was met with flying colours.

“It was necessary for us to share the message with the rakyat in a big way, and so we had both national-level and state-level launches of National Youth Day,” said Ahmad Shabery.

“The culmination of our pre-National Youth Day activities was the One Million Youth Assembly in Putrajaya.”

With the theme of “Youth Catalysts for Transformation” for National Youth Day 2011, the ministry had to engage in some radical out-of-the-box thought processes to come up with ways to engage Malaysian youth to participate in this assembly.

“We came up with a total of 220 activities across 11 segments, compared to only 88 activities in 2010. In order to make it relevant and interesting for youth, we had activities involving sports, fitness, creativity, arts and even spirituality and intellectual capacity building,” he said.

“Underlying all our ideas was our desire to translate the recommendations of the prime minister that we should inculcate principles of teamwork, participation and competitiveness among our youth.”

For the MKRA to be achieved, there was also the need to integrate another key component of the GTP and ETP initiatives by way of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs).

For the Youth and Sports Ministry, this meant approaching corporations and private entities to contribute towards the 2011 National Youth Day 2011 via sponsorship.

“We raised above RM5 million in sponsorship in 2011, and our target for 2012 is RM25 million,” said Ahmad Shabery.

“PPP was also in place when 76 companies came forward and offered 15,000 job opportunities through the Youth Job Fair programme.”

Along with that, the bar has also been set higher with a target of two million visitors for the National Youth Day 2012.

Under the Youth and Sports MKRA, other KPIs were also initiated for 2012.

After conducting a Youth Development Transformation Lab in 2011, the ministry came up with a series of initiatives aimed at youth empowerment.

The thrust of it was to develop competent individuals with excellent generic skills.

An initiative that is currently being developed is a youth portal called the Virtual Youth Resources Centre (VyREC), which is an interactive platform for disseminating information and support services for youth.

This is a new KPI, which has a set target of 10,000 new fans and followers by the end of 2012.

“We also aim to encourage youths to give their feedback and there is a KPI of 20,000 feedback postings for 2012 for us to meet.

In order to do so, we will be organising roadshows to introduce youth to this initiative,” said Ahmad Shabery.

Another of the ministry’s priority is to create a generation of youth that actively participate in volunteerism.

Thus, last year, more than 5,000 youths were trained under the civil voluntary corps Ikatan Relawan Rakyat Malaysia (Rela).

“We focused on increasing multiracial membership of Rela because this is key towards the continuation of racial harmony in a multicultural country like Malaysia,” he said.

“Through Rela, youths are also able to contribute towards a safer Malaysia by participating in crime reduction initiatives in cooperation with the police force.

Rela personnel are expected to go through vigorous exercise and training to ensure they complement the police force.”

With the development of sports in Malaysia being another key deliverable under the Youth and Sports Ministry, several noteworthy achievements were made.

For example, the ministry achieved well above its target of between 35 and 40 gold medals at the SEA Games in Jakarta.

“Malaysian athletes swept 59 gold medals at the SEA Games, something which makes us stand tall among our neighbouring countries,” said Ahmad Shabery.

In addition to that, the target of having Malaysia listed in the world rankings for 10 sports was also achieved.

Thus, in 2011, Malaysia got world recognition for its prowess in badminton, cycling, lawn bowling, squash, shooting, sepak takraw, 10-pin bowling, wushu, archery and bodybuilding.

For 2012, the bar has been set even higher, with the Youth and Sports Lab identifying the establishment of Sports Event Malaysia as a key event to spearhead initiatives aimed at developing the sporting industry in Malaysia.

“We’re going to go all out with this. We surpassed our target last year by identifying more than 6,000 potential talents to be developed into world class athletes.

“This year, we are looking for 6,500 talented young Malaysians whom we can help in developing their sporting talents and skills.”

Using sports as a unifier to promote multi-racial harmony among Malaysians from all cultural backgrounds is also a key focus in 2012.

“We’re going to ensure that at least 30 per cent of all organised sports activities are done with the purpose of promoting harmony and social cohesion within Malaysian society.

“This is a new KPI, and it involves setting up guidelines for multi-racial participation at all levels, from school programmes to corporate events,” he said.

The culmination of the Youth and Sports Ministry’s pre-National Youth Day activities last year was the One Million Youth Assembly in Putrajaya, which was launched by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak.