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Strengthened KONI vital to national sports development: Chief
"My priority is of course [finding] a solution to the problem facing our employees, who have been unpaid for the last seven months. It is embarrassing for the sports council to have this problem."
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Marciano Norman (JP/Wienda Parwitasari)
J
em>Just recently, the National Sports Council (KONI) unanimously elected Marciano Norman as its new chairman amid hopes the sports governing body can do more to help Indonesian athletes perform better on the international stage. The former State Intelligence Agency chief spoke about his plans and strategy with The Jakarta Post’s Primastuti Handayani, Dicky Christanto and Ramadani Saputra.
How will you solve the council’s internal problems and help our athletes prepare for major events in the future?
I want to transform KONI into a credible, independent, professional and modern organization. As the new KONI head, I will prioritize settlement of the current internal matters. Internal consolidation matters in this regard. I want to solve the problems first because I do not want them to hinder the realization of my plan to improve KONI as an organization.
I want the public to know about our real condition. We are currently facing financial management problems. We financially rely on the Youth and Sports Ministry’s grant. This is [not ideal] and [I] hope we can sit with other stakeholders to discuss the issue as [I believe] we cannot just let this financial problem plague the organization.
My priority is of course [finding] a solution to the problem facing our employees, who have been unpaid for the last seven months. It is embarrassing for the sports council to have this problem.
I will improve communication between KONI and the Youth and Sports Ministry as well as between KONI and the Indonesian Olympic Committee (KOI) and individual sport federations. In developing national sports, each party plays an important role. I want to enhance the development program while we [supervise] the federations.
Sports development needs to be managed in a modern way, through which we can exchange coaches and athletes with other countries and cooperate with other parties such as state-owned enterprises or private companies. We should build trust so that they are willing to get involved.
