Immigrant Athletes in Singapore: When Gold is Not Good Enough

Synopsis

Citizens’ unreceptiveness towards foreign-born athletes carrying the Singapore flag in international competitions could perhaps be mitigated or even eradicated if immigrant athletes can integrate into Singapore society and express their loyalty to the country.

Commentary

LIKE ITS fellow first world countries, Singapore has the means and resources to import promising athletes to ensure and maintain sporting success. However, compared to counterparts in the developed world, it appears Singapore society is still facing challenges to the acceptance of immigrant athletes.

Some Singaporeans have been vocal about their aversion to the Foreign Sports Talent (FST) Scheme, with a significant number of citizens expressing their sentiments online concerning the absence of pride when foreign-born athletes representing Singapore win medals at international competitions. However, the public’s reaction towards the recent retirement of Yugoslavian-born Singaporean footballer Aleksandar Duric indicates it is possible for citizens to appreciate and embrace immigrant athletes if such athletes undergo a traditional process of acquiring citizenship as well as display signs of being part of the social fabric.

Foreign Sports Talent Scheme

According to the Mulier Institute Centre for Research on Sports in Society based in the Netherlands, achievement in sports can rouse national cohesion and pride. Hence, some states invest in their national teams to ensure success in international competitions. Triumphant participation in international sport competitions not only directs acclaim and attention to nations, it also plays an important role in fortifying nationhood. Through shared victories in sports, a nation’s anthology of shared experiences is augmented.

This route to fortify national pride by way of sport has been attempted in Singapore. Sports organisations were established to scout and train young athletes. However, due to the demographic challenge of having a small population for example, promising foreign athletes have been enticed to play for Singapore. Since 1993, the FST Scheme allows sports organisations to recruit foreign athletes to represent Singapore by fast-tracking citizenship. However, in the case of Singapore, based on the public’s reaction to international table tennis success, it appears that international sporting success does not necessarily lead to a corresponding increase in national pride. It appears a number of Singaporeans attain a stronger sense of honour and pride from being represented by local-born athletes—whether they win or lose—than victories by foreign-born sportsmen.

For example, in this year’s Commonwealth Games held in Glasgow, Singapore dominated the table tennis event by taking six out of seven possible gold medals awarded, but quite a number of Singaporeans reacted negatively towards this achievement. This negativity was displayed when a photo of the winning team was posted on Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong’s Facebook page only to be followed by a barrage of comments voicing discontent.

The comments for the uploaded photo of predominantly China-born naturalised Singaporean paddlers suggest citizens prefer not winning with local-born athletes to attaining gold with foreign-born players. For the disgruntled commenters, national pride stems from being represented by who they consider born and bred Singaporean athletes regardless whether they win or not. Some netizens even coined the term “fake glory” in reference to table tennis success.

The hostility towards the sports scheme is so strong that even a local-born gold medallist at the recently concluded Asian Games in South Korea received the maligned “foreign talent” tag. Joseph Schooling’s foreign-sounding surname led to his Singaporean-ness being called into question even though, like his grandfather and father, he was born and raised in Singapore. Schooling’s father had to resort to stressing that the Asian Games medallist is a “true son of Singapore”.