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Olympic stagnation
Given its huge population, and abundant stock of talent, the modest collection of medals by no means reflects the full potential of Indonesia.
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Olympic medals for Indonesia (JP/T. Sutanto)
C
ongratulations to the badminton women’s doubles pair of Greysia Polii and Apriyani Rahayu, men’s singles shuttler Antony Ginting and weightlifters Windy Cantika Aisah, Eko Yuli Irawan and Rahmat Erwin Abdullah, not only for the medals they have won in the Olympic Games in Tokyo, but more importantly because of the pride they have given to their crises-ridden nation.
The victory of Greysia and Apriyani over their Chinese opponents on Monday’s final has kept Indonesia in the gold medal-winning club. The country has bagged at least one gold medal, except in 2012, since its historic clean sweep of badminton men’s and women’s singles titles in the Barcelona Olympics in 1992.
Some 79 out of 205 members of the International Olympic Committee have yet to feel the ecstasy of winning a gold medal, the pinnacle of achievement for athletes across the world. Competing in the Olympics is already a dream for every sportsman and woman, let alone standing on the winners’ podium to hear their country’s national anthem being played. Many are unable to hold back tears at such an emotional moment.
If only the COVID-19 pandemic had not gripped Indonesia, Greysia and the whole Indonesian team would receive a hero’s welcome home, with hundreds of sports fans escorting them from Soekarno-Hatta International Airport to the Sports and Youth Affairs Ministry office in a motorcade.
Rewards galore await the Olympic medalists back home, apart from cash bonuses ranging from Rp 1 billion (US$69,860) to Rp 5 billion the government has promised. Greysia and Apriyani, for example, will receive two houses and an apartment each, as well as Garuda Indonesia return tickets and many other accolades.
It is as if Indonesia, amid the fight against COVID-19, is throwing a party for the national sports heroes and heroines, who will bring home one gold, a silver and two bronze medals. The collection is quite reasonable for a country that only sent a 26-strong team to the Olympics.
But given its huge population, and abundant stock of talent, this modest collection of medals by no means reflects the full potential of Indonesia. Strict requirements apply for those seeking to compete in the Olympics, therefore the question is why Indonesia fails to qualify in many of the medal events featured in Tokyo.
From 1988, when Indonesia won its first-ever Olympic medal (silver), until the Tokyo Olympics, the country has made a podium finish in archery, badminton and weightlifting. Since 1988, we have won eight gold, 14 silver and 14 bronze medals from these three sports, while there are 46 Olympic sports featured in the quadrennial summer games. We have never since matched our best showing in 1992.
For a such a large country, among the world’s 20 biggest economies, this is not good enough. Perhaps it simply reflects our neglect of sports development. Our Olympic performance so far also implies we may not reap a demographic bonus in sports.
Sports development is a long-term investment, which does not have to wait until economic development bears fruit. Unless we pour more money into scouting and grooming our sports talent, this stagnation will drag on and our voice will count for little in the Olympics of the future.
