Quote of the year (for now)

Nothing much to add lately, mainly because nothing much has changed. Lately, a lot of discussion has been going on about the national juniors. Every one wants a stake in "spotting" the next top talent. Every one wants to place their hopes on a first Malaysian GM.

If the objective is for fun and laughter ala coffee shop talk, by all means, carry on. My first thought is, we will always have strong juniors. We always have players with very great promise. I mean, how is the Yeoh Li Tian of today any different from the likes of Ooi Chern Ee in the past. Let us be reminded that Chern Ee was tied 2nd in the World Youth Chess Festival, an achievement that is unmatched until today. So, my point is, juniors will always come, and some of them will go. So as far as this goes, it is great as coffee shop talk. No different from a debate comparing Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. Who cares which of them is the best in the world?

Personally, I don't get what the big fuss is about. As I said before, the goal of getting the first GM in Malaysia is utterly stupid. That should never be the end goal. So if the discussion about the Malaysian talent is to spot a potential GM, I am afraid that all that time is completely wasted.

As for anything new to add, here is simply a quote which reflects the reality (compared to all the fictional stories that has been bandied across all the blogs):

'I take it for granted there is really no such thing as “intelligence”. There are a million ways to be smart and no one’s smart in all of them; everyone can be slow on the uptake, and most human beings, whether plumbers or professors, will be remarkably apt at some things and hopeless at others. "But stupid isn’t dumb. Stupidity is different. It involves an element of will. This is why no one ever talks about “militant dumbness” or “militant cluelessness”, but they do talk about “militant stupidity”. The Polish science fiction writer Stanislaw Lem once tried to imagine the stupidest possible computer. It could only do one problem, 2+2, thought the answer was 5, and when anyone tried to tell it otherwise, it grew outraged and eventually, tried to kill them.

'It is in this sense that I we can call Bush stupid. He is a man used to deciding what he thinks is right, and then sticking to his guns no matter how insane, disastrous, or simply incorrect his premises turn out to have been. But of course this is precisely the core of what his supporters like about him. He’s firm. Decisive. A strong leader. Not like those over-intellectual flip-floppers who are always going on about how many sides there are to a problem.'

--David Graeber, "Militant Stupidity"

All of us know that the "emperor (or dictator, or Hitler, etc)" is naked. The joke is on those who support his every move.

Why First GM is Stupid

I have been planning to write such an article for a while, but there was a serious lack of motivation on my part. For some strange reason, (actually, not so strange when you think about it), certain parties are obsessed about getting Malaysia's first GM by hook or by crook. What do we really get from a first GM?

1. Inspiration/Idol

Arguably, getting a GM in our country may inspire the younger generation to pursue the same dream. I even remember the days when the juniors aspire to be an IM like Jimmy Liew. With or without the crutches of the MCF, we did manage to get several IMs, but for the most part, it was through the personal efforts of the individual players.

Let us take a look at other sports. Many people say we need more "Nicol David"s or "Lee Chong Wei"s to inspire more juniors. Has that really happened? Other than Nicol, there are not many strong squash players around. I saw some potential in the Low sisters (Low Wee Wern and Low Wee Nee), who are also from Penang. But is this truly a product of inspiration from Nicol? Who else besides them? Don't you think that after being World No.1 for 3 years, it would already garner enough attention and publicity to create more champions?

What about badminton? Badminton is of a very different nature because even before the arrival of Lee Chong Wei, Malaysia was already a very prominent country in the sport. Those of you who are more senior will remember Eddy Choong, Tan Aik Huang, Ng Boon Bee, and the likes. The younger ones will remember the 1992 Thomas Cup win in Stadium Negara. All this happened before the arrival of Lee Chong Wei. You may ask, was Lee Chong Wei inspired by our past champions? Maybe. Look at China. They have player after player who are just as competitive.

But the real question is, why can't we be inspired by Champions of other countries? Yeah, they may not be Malaysians, but that does not mean they do not have qualities that we can emulate. In fact, some of them have to face much tougher obstacles than the ones in Malaysia.

So, I don't buy this hogwash about having an idol to inspire other Malaysians. We have idols all over the world and if you choose to close your minds to them, it is your own loss.

2. Something to be proud of

This is an even bigger bullshit than No.1. Many people preach the spirit of Malaysia Boleh when we see other Malaysians perform well in the international stage. I'd like to go back to the examples of Nicol and Chong Wei. If we take a hard and honest look at their achievements, we should be asking ourselves, is it really "Malaysia Boleh" or "Sendiri Boleh"? What has Malaysia done for those two in helping them achieve what they have today? The only thing Malaysia has given the both of them that is noteworthy is the biggest insult (my personal opinion), that is, by calling them Datuk. Why in the world would a decent young woman want to be called "Datuk" (Grandfather)? Lee Chong Wei is not even 30 years of age and he too, is being labelled a grandfather.

Another joke about this is that we as Malaysians, like to claim other people's success as our own. Nicol and Chong Wei's achievements are their own. We may have cheered them on in the stadium, or in front of our TV screens, but that is the extent of our achievements in squash and badminton. We have done NOTHING, and hence have NOTHING to be proud of. They are not products of the Malaysian system. They are the products of their very own hard work and dedication. This is the message that I hear Nicol David preach every morning on radio (Fly FM or Hitz FM or something).

Claiming to be proud of the success of one person is like claiming that Malaysia has the tallest twin towers in the world? What is the big deal? What good has it done for anyone? We want the biggest this, the longest that, the first this and that, all for the sake of ego-boosting. Look at Dubai. It boasts the tallest building in the world, but it almost went bankrupt trying to achieve that feat. Are we as individuals so devoid of personal achievements that we need to go out of our way to feel proud of someone else's achievements?

3. What is wrong with importing a GM?

Very often, we look over to our neighbour, Singapore, and mock them for importing GMs to fill their roster. Let me pose this question, can Malaysia even attract a GM to play for Malaysia if it wanted to? Why not? Are we too poor to pay for a GM? Maybe, maybe not. If we look at it deeper again, we will understand that Singapore (good or bad), has a system that attracts talent. This is not only in chess, but in all areas in Singapore (in sports, in the workplace etc). Why don't you ask, why do the GMs want to play for Singapore so willingly, that they are willing to foresake their own country? Is it purely because of money? Or is it because Singapore recognizes their talent?

Let us consider a hypothetical situation. In fact, this is as real as it gets. As we all know, Malaysia is suffering from severe brain drain. Our best minds are leaving us for greener pastures. It is not just the money, but the quality of life, the  recognition etc. Now, who is to say, if we do end up getting our first GM or super GM after years of struggle, that he/she won't just move to another country to play for that particular country? It happens everywhere, even to Super GMs. Sergey Karjakin now plays for Russia instead of his home country, Ukraine. Gata Kamsky plays for the US, Boris Gelfand plays for Israel. So there is nothing wrong if Zhang Zhong plays for Singapore. It happens. So what's going to stop Malaysia's first GM from NOT playing for Malaysia?

So, we come back to the point of attracting foreign GMs to play for Malaysia. If we have the culture and environment to attract foreign GMs, then only we have the capability to keep our very own GM, if he/she ever comes by. If not, who is to say that the GM won't leave Malaysia? Brain drain is a reality. Singapore has foreign GMs and those GMs have helped their locals to improve.

This is like the story of Proton. We insist on having our own national car (like having our own first GM), but at what cost? Just like we pushed so hard for Mas to become a GM, but he has failed, just like Proton has.

Look at our neighbour, Thailand. They do not have their own national car manufacturer. But Thailand is the 3rd largest car exporter in Asia (if I am not mistaken, only behind Japan and Korea). How many cars does Malaysia export? Thailand has a robust and resilient automobile manufacturing industry thanks to its liberal economy. Conversely, Malaysians are all suffering because we have to pay huge import and excise duties for purchasing foreign cars to subsidize Proton. Otherwise, you have to buy the low quality Proton cars. Thank god for Perodua (which intelligently collaborated with Daihatsu). Do we not see this similarity in the chess scene in Malaysia? Are we going to keep focusing on subsidizing one or two people (with potential) to become a GM at the cost of everyone else?

Whether it is Yeap Eng Chiam, or Yeoh Li Tian, or Teh De Zen, or Tan Li Ting or whoever the next top junior is, the goal should not be to focus on individuals. The goal should be to focus on creating a culture that promotes excellence, and recognizes achievement. That is of utmost importance. If talents and achievements are duely recognized without bias, I can assure you that the GM will come automatically. We don't have to subsidize them.

In short, this goal of striving so hard to get a first GM is utterly stupid. We need the right environment to grow a GM and so far, I have not seen anything close. Hopefully, I will be proven wrong someday.

P/S: The strong language and provocative tone in this post is intentional. You Malaysians need to wake up and smell the coffee. I am open for debate on this subject and feel free to post in the comments section. As always, only vulgarities will not be tolerated.

Get Paid to Play?

Jimmy said something about how some senior players should be paid appearance fees to play. There may be some merit to that, but I must say that I can't agree with such additional broad-based preferential treatment. There is already the incentive where FIDE rated players are given free entry, and also how the top 8 players being eligible to represent the country. On top of that, there is also the prize money offered. Granted, it is not much, but since when do chess players in Malaysia feel like they are entitled to high prize monies?

Jimmy is right to say that there is too much to lose, and too little to gain. Nonetheless, being a strong believer of the incentive-based system, I also doubt that urging seniors to do some "national service" will do the trick.

However, I think paying appearance fees for the IMs to play would not be a bad idea. I must say that I am utterly disappointed that both Mas and Mok were given automatic spots to play. It is not that I feel they are not qualified to play for Malaysia, but "forcing" them to play for their spot would certainly encourage a more competitive culture in Malaysian chess. In fact, any of the IMs that we have are welcome.

I just don't think that NMs should be paid, despite the fact that some of them are actually hard-earned. Perhaps the defending champion can be paid an appearance fee, but most certainly not all the past NMs. Please rethink the incentive system so that all players would know what behavior is rewarded and what behavior is "punished". Incentives should be exclusive and be performance-based.

The Culture of Success

Anonymous asked about what success would entail.

From the choices you listed, the answer would be all of them, and none of them. As strange as it may seem to you, Malaysia as a country has always committed the mistakes of having "absolute" goals. When you set targets like, having a GM, becoming a top ASEAN country, having X number of chilren play chess, etc., you are making a mistake of being myopic. Why? Simple, because once you achieve them, the question is, what next? Everything will stop there. You have to create new goals and so on and so forth. You may ask, what is wrong with that? The problem with these goals is that, they are very superficial and can be attained through artificial means. We do not just want to achieve quantitative achievements, but quality ones as well. Let me explain.

If your target is to get a GM, it can be obtained through many ways, some good and some bad. For example, in some way, Malaysia has made this mistake. They threw a lot of money on just one player in hopes that he becomes a GM, which he failed. This means that all the resources have been wasted. Compare this to implementing an incentive-based system where every player who reaches 2400 in rating is given RM2,000 travel allowance for each tournament, and players with 2500 in rating will get full sponsorships in tournaments. This kind of system creates a more competitive environment to fish out a GM. This is not to say, I agree with you that getting a GM can be considered a success. My point is this: You can set goals, but how you get there is at least as important as where you want to go. The quality of success is important. Compare the 2 methods above. The first method, if that chosen player fails to get his GM, then all the money would have been wasted. In the second method, the incentive-based sponsorship will at least create a chess environment that is full of strong players even if we fail to find a GM.

That's why to me, I consider Malaysian chess a success when we can implement a system that encourages sustainable improvement. So the goals that we set should be goals on periodical improvements, rather than absolute goals. For example, the target is to add fifty 2200 rated players a year, twenty 2300 rated players a year, and five 2400 rated players a year. This way, when we can achieve these goals we provide a strong sustainable base for success. If you can add more and more strong players every year, the pyramid will build itself. You will keep pushing the strongest players upwards. Of course, this has to be combined with a merit-based system where the best player is rewarded the most. There is no room for cronyism. This is the kind of system that can ensure long term and sustainable success. All the other goals like being the best in ASEAN, getting a first GM, etc etc etc will come automatically. You don't even have to worry about it.

However, the caveat is this. It is not what I think that matters. What I proposed above is just one idea. The important takeaway from this is that our goals must build on the quality of our success.

That is why, if you look at the Singapore Budget 2010, the Singaporean government has targeted a productivity growth of 1.5% per year for the next 10 years. Then you compare with Malaysia's Budget 2011. Malaysia only knows how to target an income per capita level of USD16,000 by 2020. The important way to get there is to through productivity gains, but Malaysia is on its way down the downward spiral by trying to implement mega-projects all over again. This difference will be even more distinct in the next 5-10 years. Singapore's ingenious leaders have long understood the importance in the quality of its economic growth. Malaysia is only interested in the quantity of growth. If you want to increase GDP by RM12 billion, it is easy. Just build a crooked bridge to Jawa, no matter how useless the bridge is.

Remember, it is the quality of your growth that counts.

The Culture of Chess

Replying to John.

Associating Malaysia with prestige is always a dangerous issue. Malaysia has been a nation of prestige-seeking for more than 30 years. Just think about the Petronas Twin Towers, our very own national car, Proton, etc, biggest this, tallest that, longest this and that.

These prestige and glamorous achievements have come at huge costs to the country. Inciting such a "feel-good" environment is not only costly, but is also a myopic goal. It creates interest in the short run, but fails to address the long-term structural issues. I think you would agree that the fundamental issues have to come first. The foundation for Malaysian chess has to be strong, before we start creating a big hoo-hah and show off with big scale events. We must first lay the proper foundation. Just like you cannot construct the building first and then think about reinforcing the foundations as you build.

Chess in Malaysia is at a critical stage because it is at an all time low. You can do no wrong because any change can be considered an improvement. So it is time to lay down the proper foundation. Think about the kind of federation and environment you want to have in 5-10 years. Work towards that.

While organizing the K visits is a huge achievement that commanded a great deal of effort, the fruits of its labour is rather short term. This is by no means belittling your achievements. It is indeed an experience of a lifetime to bring the 2 ex-world champions here. I agree that publicity is important, but Malaysia is not at that stage yet. While publicity can popularize chess, what is more important is not to make chess "cool". Yes, becoming a chess hub can certainly bring in the coolness factor, but it is not the children that you need to convince. It is the parents. To make chess a national past time is just a part of it.

The more important issue is to create an awareness on why chess is beneficial to children. Nowadays, parents willingly send their children to piano lessons, Kumon math classes, ballet lessons and other such extracurricular activities. That is a good thing. It has evolved from the past where most parents prevent their children from pursuing extracurricular activities as they feel it might be a distraction. The question is, why not chess?

Among chess players, it goes without saying that the benefits of chess as a vehicle for developing intellectual competence are a given. But how do parents know this? I suppose in my limited capacity, I have yet to think of how to publicize the benefits of chess. But I strongly believe that this is the key way to create sustainable interest in chess. Not some big hoo-hah event. I am glad you brought up Bilbao. Yes, Bilbao is a chess city. The next question is, how many GMs does Bilbao have? No doubt, it creates interest and a spectacle, but is the interest in chess or in the event? Those are 2 very separate things. Just like football. Everyone loves to watch football, even in Malaysia. You can bring in teams like Manchester United, Arsenal and what not to Malaysia, but how does this improve the quality of football in Malaysia? The people's interests are in the event. Not in the game itself. We must focus on creating an interest in the game. The big events are just window-dressing.

Nonetheless, your point is most certainly valid when it comes to organizing events. Networking is crucial. But these micro-factors come later, after we have set the correct macro-landscape.

As for your query with regards to the multitude of tournaments, it is simply because of geographical reasons. While it is true that there are only 52 weeks, there are also 14 states in Malaysia. Having a tournament in KL and having a tournament in Penang attracts different groups of players. There is no shortage of players when it comes to events. In fact, I might even say that the spread of these events are good. These events keep the competitive spirit alive among states. The Penang-KL-Selangor rivalry has been going on for decades, although it has somewhat waned in recent times.

Nonetheless, I was lucky to have witnessed the following events that I would like to share:

In Penang, in the early 1990s, the only school to organize a chess open was Penang Free School. Now, many other schools have followed suit. I was informed that in the MSSPP (Penang State Schools Championship), there is a prize offered for "Best Overall School". This prize not only takes into account the best results during the tournament, but also awards points for schools that organize open tournaments, publish chess bulletins, etc. This encourages a positive chess culture.

I have personally participated in these tournaments that are 99% run by students. The chess association does assist in the logistics (i.e. providing arbiter, chess sets and clocks, etc). These are not small tournaments. The biggest of such tournaments I attended was one of the PFS Opens, with a grand total of over 250 participants. Penang is a small state, and a team of school students with the guidance of teachers and little help from the chess association managed to organize an event of such scale. That is impressive. This is the kind of culture that we should hope to inculcate, where the students not only benefit from playing the game, but learn other important skills from organizing these events, and publishing chess bulletins etc.

In short, to promote chess, we need to have the right culture and mindset. Organizing events, buying chess books etc. are just actions derived from the culture. We must first get that right. Only then, can the growth be sustainable.

How To Spend the Moolah?

Agree with most of what Anonymous says.

Bringing foreigners to Malaysia is one thing, but bringing them to win our money in a rapid tournament is not worth it. Bear in mind that it is a rapid tournament. Also, RM14,000 does not have to be spent on chess tournaments. I am personally not a fan of allegros.

So how should we spend this money? For example, the RM14,000 can be used to build a useful chess library. You know how many chess books you can buy with RM14,000? That is per year. Then you can make the chess centre a popular hang out place, where people come and spar and read chess books. Strong players may even gather there for discussion and analysis. The benefits could be multiplied and this investment is long term in nature. The RM14,000 "lasts forever" because the books will always be there, instead of being in some foreigner's hands and spent on something else. Heck, it doesn't even have to be RM14,000. It can be RM4,000.

The serious tournaments should remain. The Malaysia Open, KL Open etc. I am not against that. Malaysians have every chance to play against foreign players then. Why need so many rapid events for foreigners?

Other ideas include, "chess scholarships". Organize several strong junior tournaments over the year and use that money as a sponsorship to the best 3 performers in these tournaments to go play in other countries (such as Vietnam, India, China, Philippines, Indonesia, Australia etc.).

I am sure many other people can come up with much better ideas to use the money. My supposedly weak mind has limited ideas. But the idea to keep the competitive spirit alive among juniors and seniors is this thing called meritocracy. As long as everyone can see the goal, they will be willing to work towards it. The current situation is a result of people moving the goal post all the time. Deserving players are not selected. Our national tournaments are treated lightly by our "senior" players. Most of them don't even take part. If you employ a system where results matter, people will work for it.

As for the neighboring countries, John has hit it spot on. The difference is the hunger. I already wrote about it. I couldn't believe a Vietnamese junior player would hammer out 2.5 hours of chess to win an opposite colored bishop ending. I can assure you that these kids have a lot more to lose than Malaysians/Singaporeans. To them, chess is their ticket to freedom. If they fail, they will just be some guy. We can always fall back on studies and other such things. But, that said, still, if the goals are clear and attainable, there will be people who will be willing to work for them. Right now, hard work does not seem to pay in the Malaysian chess scene. So the simple answer is, reward hard work!

The Power of All

Replying to this.

When one person decides to protest the powers that be, it will be easy for the greater organization to just ignore that small fry.

I have time and again stressed that my goal is not to complain. I want everyone to know what is wrong in the chess arena. Because up until now, no one really knows. All they do is just play in "nice" tournaments. Raymond, to be honest, NO ONE knows about these fixed tournaments. How do we stop participating in them? Maybe it would be good if you can publish a list of fixed tournaments so that I do not make the mistake in joining them? By the way, that was sarcasm. I feel like I need to cue you when I am sarcastic now.

For change to happen, it definitely requires the support of more than one person. Heck, it would probably require the support of the majority. But the problem here is, the majority sees NOTHING WRONG with the current situation. Why? It is because they are not aware.

So if the majority does not see the need for change, whatever revolutionary ideas or what you call "wish-lists" will never go through. My goal is not to complain. Your narrow mind has led you to that conclusion. I am spreading information so that EVERYONE knows where the problems lie. The majority MUST know what is wrong so that we can fight for change, together.

Even if you were to be able to implement change, without the support of the majority, it will sooner or later revert back to the same old rot that we were once in. The people's mindset must change first. Unless you employ a dictatorship, which basically means you can do whatever you want without the permission of the people, nothing will ever change. Hey wait, that sounds familiar.

Your call for individual empowerment only makes you sleep better at night. You can tell yourself, I did my best, and that's the best a man can do. Wrong! I am sure I do not need to educate you on how a team of individuals can accomplish more than the sum of its parts. I am now collecting this sum. I have a plan, and there is a long way to go before the combination is fully played out. I am fully aware of my role. What I am doing now is putting the pieces in the right squares. You are just the distraction.

You are just fighting your own battle without a real plan. You look at your position and tell yourself that you have a good bishop, even though you are playing 1 rook down. If you try too hard to focus on what has been done correctly and ignore what is wrong with the position, you would have failed in objectively evaluating your position. You cannot just "forget" that you are 1 rook down and play along.

As any practical chess player would tell you, you must first acknowledge the threats to your position. If you ignore your opponent's king side attack, and try to go for an all out attack on the queen side and hope that you beat your opponent before he mates you, then you are just playing like an amateur.

We (I suppose I need to be specific here, since you tend to be confused with who I am referring to. By "we", I mean the chess community.) are all still at the stage of assessing where we went wrong. Only the minority have honestly tackled this issue. No one is dwelling on the past. Do you dare challenge the saying, "Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it"? What you now know as history is only 7 short years in a grand scheme of events. Even if you want to focus on what we have done right, there is a lot more history to be examined than just the past 7 years. If you study China's history and only look at the past 32 years, you would have only seen how China has reformed and emerged as an economic power despite the small glitch in Tiananmen. But China's history is more than 5000 years-old. China has been an economic power before. What happened? We cannot afford this myopia. We must always have the bigger picture in mind.

You are like a history student who just took a glance at the past 32 years and forgot about how the 5000 years has formed the Chinese people as we know them today. But you want to go ahead and conquer the future. That is of utmost danger to the chess community. If the Chinese leaders believe they can become a "super-power" again and forget that even the mighty China was brought to its knees not more than 500 years ago, they will be bound to repeat their mistake.

Let go of your imagined fears. Do not be afraid of admitting mistakes. Find the right dots to join. Don't just keep joining dots blindly.

Natural Selection

This is Malaysia's selection process. It is only natural. That's how it has been done for years.

Jimmy, I was trying to be fair. Let me explain the specific example to you, this time, with evidence. Have a look at the cross table below. It is from the tournament that I was talking about, the NAG 2010 U-18 Boys:

Now, let's just assume the first 2 players declined. There is a tie from 3rd-5th place, each player scoring 4.5 points. First of all, should Izz be offered the place? The 4th and 5th placed players might complain. There should at least be a play-off. There is no reason why Izz is better than the other 2 players despite having a better tie-break. He did not even meet the 1st placed player. Heck, he did not even meet Mark or Nicholas. Is it his luck?

Now, let's say Izz declined the offer. Does Greg have the right to offer Mark the place? Just look at the cross table. Mark drew with Nicholas Chong in the last round. If you were to use the results of this NAG alone, Mark has not really proved to be better than Nicholas Chong. What would have happened if Mark accepted the offer and Nicholas were to protest? Nicholas' tie-break was penalized because he was paired with the 1st placed player, Ken Wei in the first round. This is by virtue of seeding, which is probably luck.

If Mark was offered the place, then Nicholas should be offered too. At least a play-off of some sort should be held. Or am I wrong? I am only trying to be fair. I have nothing to gain from this. I just hope for a transparent and fair selection process.

Laughing Stock

When you do a bad parody, the joke will be on you. Here is one example of a bad parody. And below is my reply to it.

I am sure your second class attempt at humor is appreciated by all. You have completely missed my sarcasm in pointing out that Hamid is a Grandmaster and that WE are playing blindfolded. When I said WE, I meant everyone in the chess community who has refused to see or ignored the facts.

An impersonation is good only when it accurately portrays the character that is being impersonated. While I have singled out Hamid, I have also talked about the culture of meritocracy and competitiveness that is crucial to chess development. The reason I singled out Hamid is because I have identified the root of the problem. Have you? You are just asking us to try this and that until we succeed.

I have provided the simplest and easily, the fairest solution of all. MERITOCRACY. I have talked about this again and again. Your ignorance and closed mind has shut out my main point. Why don't you ask Greg to implement a fully meritocratic solution, since you talk to him so much? Maybe you can help me pass along this message to him?

Is it REALLY so hard to reward your players based on their results? ALL OF YOU must be so stumped. If you select players for international tournaments through chess results, not only do you get all the strong players to participate in these tournaments, but you give everyone a chance to succeed. 2 things will be achieved from this.

1. You get a wider base of strong players because now, your culture has allowed "ANYONE and EVERYONE" the chance to succeed.

2. You get a larger incentive for the top-tier players to improve. Because now, they MUST stay ahead of the pack, lest they do not qualify to represent Malaysia.

This is a win-win scenario. But meritocracy is hampered by vested interests who hold key positions, i.e. people who call the shots. I find it disturbing that Greg has offered a 4th placed player from ONE single tournament a spot to represent Malaysia. Firstly, everyone knows that usually, the 4th placing is inaccurate as it is typically determined by tie-break, which is subject to luck quite often (via pairing, Bucholz etc). Secondly, the result of 4th placing was just from 1 tournament, despite it being the Nationals. So if a player is first in MSSM (which is arguably a much stronger tournament), consistently performing well in other local tournaments, but was pushed to 5th place by tie-break in the National Age-Group, he would have been excluded from a place to represent Malaysia. That is why, we need to fix a group of tournaments and make it public so that all potential players will have a fair go at it. The most consistent player should be selected to represent Malaysia. Why is this so hard?

People who perform well at many tournaments are not being selected to represent Malaysia. The selection criteria changes EVERY YEAR. Why don't you think about things carefully and FIX a criteria and PROMISE to use it for the next 3 years. Allow people to succeed within a proper system. I guarantee you, Malaysian chess will see success within 3-5 years.

The reason all the strong players have "failed" as you pointed out, is that they were not allowed to succeed. Most of them just moved on to greener pastures which frankly, makes more sense.

So Raymond, I would appreciate it if you can just change "Hamid" to "lack of meritocracy" as the culprit. If this ONE simple thing cannot be implemented, then there is no hope for Malaysian chess, regardless of how many millions in sponsorship you can acquire. Try this ONE thing. Please, I beg you. Let the chess results speak for themselves.

Hiding in Broad Daylight: Transparency

Replying to mtheory:

Everyday I wish that what I said is not true. When little or no progress is shown for the past 20 years despite the "millions" that Raymond claims Dato Tan has showered the chess community, it is just too hard for me to swallow.

Replying to abdooss:

It is easy to suspect someone is on the take simply because of the lack of transparency. Granted, even the most prestigious auditing firms can be misled, but all necessary actions should be taken to prevent this. For example, publish the breakdown of the accounts on the MCF website.

Given what you said, I would like to point out that even the MACC's effectiveness is in question.
More importantly, many of the MCF's practices are "ONLY" borderline illegal but probably closer to unethical. Just to give you a few examples of the things that happen in broad daylight (never mind the under the table dealings yet):

1. Olympiad selection

The most obvious one is the Olympiad selection. Granted, super-sub Greg did manage to score a massive 66.7% but I am sure I do not need to say more about the shadiness of this year's Olympiad selection. Maybe Malaysia needs a really capable team captain. Mas and Mok are "obviously not qualified to be captains".

OK, maybe one slip-up is not good enough to bitch about the MCF. Let us examine some of the past Olympiads. In 2004, Malaysia was represented by Tan Vooi Giap (who?) who played a grand total of 1 game. In 2002, Greg was also playing. In 2000, there was Azahari Md Nor. In 1998, not only was Azahari in the team, guess what, Hamid too made it too!! In 1994, Sabar Hashim was in the team. I suppose it is a prevailing trend where the towel boys are included in the team list. I am almost sure someone will be quick to point out that in SOME years, we sent "legitimate" teams. For it to be truly legitimate, we need to lay out exactly is the criteria for the team selection? What must I do if I want to try to qualify? I am not talking about the lone spot offered by winning the National Closed. Even then, Evan Capel was not selected to play.

The fact that they can keep doing this again and again and again means that they are telling you, "You can't do anything about this!"

2. Free trip for officials

OK, this is a partial extension from No. 1. By virtue of selecting free-loaders, they get a free trip to whichever country. Now, what about the other international tournaments, especially the age-group tournaments? Often times, players are FORCED, I repeat, FORCED to fork out money to pay for the MCF officials to go along for the trip. I wish to emphasize on the word "forced" because the MCF officials will always tell you that you have two options. You can choose to pay the extra money for the officials, or you can choose not to go. How about I give you a choice? You can choose to show us the details of the accounts with your clothes on, or without your clothes on. How is that for transparency? And many times, these officials are plain tourists. Sometimes, the players only see them after they get off the plane and check into the hotel. After that, maybe you catch a glimpse of them once or twice during breakfast. Other than that, the next time you get to see them is when you check out and get on the plane to go home. Does that sound familiar to anyone of you? I suppose that is better than when these officials pretend to care about the games and "try" to coach the players. Oh wait, that happens too.

3. Hotel room allocation

In events like the Malaysian Open, we all know that the GMs and IMs are offered rooms at or near the playing venue. Now, I can't give you the exact number of rooms that were allocated, but let's just say that the number of hotel rooms were intentionally overbooked and the vacant rooms were "reserved" for God knows who. I was informed that these rooms were used as bargaining chips to gain "personal favors" among other personal benefits. I don't know about you, but is this even illegal? Probably not, especially this kind of thing is rampant in any organization. I suppose if that's the case, we can't blame the MCF. I guess I should thank them for not wasting the rooms. At least they put it to good use.

4. Over-billing

I guess this generally comes into the transparency issue. As Rationality pointed out, the exchange rate that the MCF has been using for the past few years has been USD1 = RM3.80. The exchange rate has not been USD1 to RM3.80 since 2005 when our 5th Prime Minister unpegged the RM. Just have a look at the chart. The data was obtained from the US Federal Reserve. Shocking? There are many other cases of over-billing but it is too unfortunate I cannot prove this without the proper accounts being made public. But neither can the MCF prove its innocence. I suppose everyone is innocent until proven guilty. I wonder how it works when someone hides the evidence.

So abdooss... what I have underlined here is really ONLY borderline illegal. Is it really wrongdoing? Hmmm... You tell me.

No Free Lunch

Replying to First GM.

It is NOT OK that the majority do not know what is going on. It is because of this lack of transparency that we are where we are today.

Let me share a personal story with you. For those in the know, you may know who I am after this story, or at least have some clue. I know a junior player, S, who obtained 2nd placing at the National Age Group some time back.

In the selection process for the Asian Junior tournament that year, the champion had declined to play for whatever reason, and the place was offered to the 3rd placed player, skipping out S who was actually tied for first place but only lost out in the playoff.

Needless to say, S' parents protested but by the time they had found out about it, the MCF had ALREADY submitted the registration and had "assumed" that S would not want to play because he had PMR exams coming. S had found out ONLY because one of the players selected for the Girls category had contacted S to ask if S was playing. S did not even know that the MCF was sending any players.

The joke of this is that the 3rd placed player was exactly the same age, and had PMR exams too. So clearly, the excuse was not valid.

Rumor has it, some MCF official or other (I will refrain from giving names since I have no way of proving this), and the parents of the 3rd placed player had a closer relationship (with a possibility of bribes involved (which may or may not be monetary, as that parent had let slip of such an occurrence during a conversation with other parents).

So now you see, whether they are the best tournament director or not, or whether they are the best secretaries or not, it doesn't matter when there is no integrity. How can a place to represent Malaysia be offered to someone discretely? Does this sound familiar to you? Did Greg tell the world he offered you and Mark a place?

To address what you said about Hamid and Greg being in positions that they are the best at, let me share a famous example with you. Remember Bernie Madoff? He is one of the most brilliant investors in our time. How did he cheat so many other brilliant people out of USD50 billion? This was made possible by his reputation of being great with money.

But just because he is good at what he does, does not mean it is good for everyone. What he lacked was integrity and the whole scheme was shrouded by a lack of transparency. No one knew what he was doing. None of his investors did. No one questioned him as long as he was promising great returns.

Back to Malaysian chess. Putting aside the argument that Hamid and Greg are doing a great job, how can you insist that they are still the right people for the job if there is a lack of integrity and transparency? This was clearly shown again in the selection for the Olympiad.

Now, to push it one step further, if you examine why they had shunned you when you requested for a post mortem as a sponsor, if you think carefully, and connect that dot, to this dot that I have just shown you, it will be clear as day.

You had "forgotten" to give them a cut of the sponsorship. That is why their attitude was utterly poor towards you. They got even more scared when you requested for a post mortem. Now do you understand? It is not because they are lazy to attend to your queries. People who have the capability to "single-handedly" organize the Malaysian Chess Festival have no room to be lazy. Now, the next question is, why do they bother working so hard? There is no such thing as a free lunch.

Now, if you can connect all the dots since the first time I posted on your blog regarding the Olympiad selection, I have always pushed for a system that will ALLOW our juniors to succeed, a system of meritocracy. You can get all the GMs in the world to train our juniors, but if their achievements are "overlooked", then our junior players will always be junior players.

If rent-seeking continues to be prevalent, NO SPONSORS will ever come in. Raymond Siew, do you see the whole picture now? Do you know why your sponsorship and efforts will NEVER be appreciated by these goons? Next time you want to sponsor the MCF, try offering to pay for the officials to follow along for the trip. Maybe add in a presidential suite booking. It could do wonders.

Lack of Hunger

This is in reply to John's comment. I find the message important enough to warrant a new post.

Totally agree that we lack the hunger. This lack of hunger in Malaysia is born out of 2 reasons. As you correctly pointed out, the first, is through complacency. That is pretty self-explanatory. On top of this complacency, Malaysians are also good at denying that they have fallen behind. All thanks to this spirit of Malaysia Boleh.

The second cause of this lack of hunger, is a more deeply rooted problem. This problem lies beyond the realm of chess, unfortunately. But to stick within the topic, I would like to point out that the lack of hunger is simply due to the complete absence of meritocracy. This socio-political issue has been going on for about 40 years and it has rooted itself in chess.

So much so that the powers that be have begun to believe that they can get away with anything. This is witnessed by the selection for Malaysia's Olympiad team. How dare the MCF select Gregory Lau to represent Malaysia in broad daylight. This is like rubbing mud in the chess players' faces and telling them that the MCF can select whoever they want, and there is nothing you can do about it.

You can play the best chess in the world, but I won't select you because I have my interests to take care of. So why should any of the chess players try, because their efforts may or may not be rewarded. Their fates are subject to the mercy of these almighty chess officials.

Let me recount a personal example. In my younger days, I had the great fortune of playing against a Vietnamese junior player and skipping all the details, we ended up in a position of opposite colored bishops with 5 pawns each. In any other case, it would have been a dead draw. I was really curious why he had refused the draw offer, and the game continued for another two and a half hours. Finally, I had succumbed to fatigue and overlooked a simple King penetration that led to my loss. Full credit to that guy's determination.

I was really curious as to why he had tried so hard for the win. Later, I found out that the Vietnamese government had promised USD1,000 to any player for a 3rd place finish, which could have only been achieved if he had won that game. I will always remember the hunger that was shown to me that day. I only wish that I had half the hunger in anything I do in my life.