“I sincerely apologise for causing any grievances, any stress.”
So said the President of the Singapore Table Tennis Lee Bee Wah, last night.
So finally, a week after the furore began, Ms Lee has done the needful and apologised. For those who are wondering what happened, Ms Lee had blown up in Beijing after the number one male player, Gao Ning, had played his game without a coach. He lost the game badly and was in tears after. Ms Lee said the team manager Antony Lee was responsible and should be fired.
Sitting behind her were team manager Antony Lee and Liu Guodong, together with Gao Ning, Singapore’s number one male player, and the three silver medalists, Feng Tianwei, Li Jiawei and Wang Yuegu. They sat there looking like they would rather be somewhere else than at that press conference.
Looks like Minister for Sports Dr Vivian Balakrishnan effectively knocked everyone’s heads together to sit down at that press conference and say what needed to be said. The minister told the press:
“I can announce quite categorically that the crisis is over.”
Yes, it was quite a crisis. The spiralling euphoria generated by the first silver medal in 48 years became a vortex of toxic bad feelings churned up by the Lee Bee Wah outburst. Having spent the days after her outburst saying “No comment,” she has now said sorry.
As they say, better late than never.
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I AGREE WITH TRACKER SAM!
MASUOYEVOLI
I would like to state that the person employed for Presidentship for the Spore Table Tennis Association should at least have a certain amount of experience in the area of sports. One who does not have ample experience in that area, yet goes off criticising others before even being fully aware of the situations, happennings, and not giving anyone time to explain, is certainly not the ideal President for an association. MPs need to take responsibillty for what they say, a simple apology by her will NOT cover up for the inconvenience she has caused. She should not have went aroud pointing fingers at others, but rather take in the situation and come up with a solution to resolve it. Firing the manager who helped Singapore to their 1st Olympics’ medal is simply not the way.
Just like what the government have always been saying. We have to mutch the corporate pay scheme for the MPs. So let do what the corporate are doing, accountability many people cannot be wrong. If a comment by a high profile figure upset the member of public, she should take responsibility and resign. Otherwise by staying the sour story stay.