Cambodian Disables Have Potential in Para Olympic
I am so pleased to meet with our Cambodian athletes. While I am in sports wears, you are in official suits. The fact that I am wearing number 9 is because it is the number that I have used since when I first practiced volleyball and football. You may have seen some of the pictures of me since 1980s.
We are meeting here today to reward efforts of winners who took part in the ASEAN Para Games in Singapore. I was so happy on that day that our athletes won gold medals. I dug for photos and posted on Facebook late at night to express my greeting. I am also an honorary President of the Cambodian Para Olympic but I did not have time to work for it. However, Mr. Ee Veasna has been doing a great job.
I convey my appreciation to every efforts made by the disables. While holding a swimming contest in Kompong Cham provincial town, I also noticed that there were many disable athletes among them. I said it very often that we must deliver that though we maybe are disable physically but we are strong in our mental will. When we had our para Olympic established, we sent our teams to Australia and we had learnt that the Cambodian potential, compared to others, would be amazing as long as they work hard, and be patient.
I am calling you to continue to keep up this spirit. We have a good example of handicap persons at Taken Koh Sla Handicap Soldier Development Centre, where one of them, with both arms amputated, grew and reap the most fruits. He could drive motorcycle and later drives a car. I urge Minister Thoang Khon to review one thing about one fact. We sent good physical sportsmen for contest abroad and they returned with less number of medals, compared to those obtained by our disable athletes. However, there seems to be different greeting and attention for their successes. I took the chance to break the news on our disables’ sports achievement in my Facebook.
Talent and Training Are What They Need
Two volleyball competitions of disables took place in Phnom Penh already. We did not succeed in getting number 1 or 2 but our disables have proven that won all in Asia and competed with those from Poland, Czech and Germany. As for football, I said many times that it would not depend on how big a population that a country has. It would depend on talent and how much training we have. Look at China and India. China is a 1.3 billion-population country but it was hard for them to choose the best 11 players for football. India is a 1.2 billion-population but they could not do better. China had made its way to World Cup once in 2002. India did not. Whether a country as more or less population is not the determined factor. Dismayed by a small population Cambodia has, you may look at Korea, both north and south, who made their ways to World Cup […]
A Historical Remark – Cambodia All Stars Versus Buriram United
… The fact that our team was victorious over the Thai football team was remarkable in comparison to what the history had recorded. HE Hang Chuon Naron (Minister of Education, Youth and Sports) said Cambodia waited for 59 years for this day, when its football team won over one of the best football teams from Thailand. In fact, on that day of the match, looking at our historical fact that in 1971, the Cambodian team did its best to get even, I did not have much hope. What made me finally impress with the match? It was the match to commemorate the 65 years establishment of diplomatic relations between the Kingdom of Cambodia and the Kingdom of Thailand.
The match between Cambodian All Stars and Buriram United was a topic of discussion before and during the joint Cambodian-Thai Cabinet meeting. Initially we invited Thai Minister of Education to represent their side in joining with Cambodian Minister of Education, Youth and Sports to preside over the event. Later, to increase significance of the two countries’ relations, Thai Prime Minister HE Prayuth Chan Ocha, decided to send Deputy Prime Minister HE Tanasak Patimapragorn to honor the match. One hour before the match, HE Tanasak paid a courtesy call on me at the Peace Palace. He said to me “maybe the Cambodians should save Thais some goals.” I thought to myself, I did not have that much hope based on some facts from the past matches.
Two Different Rewards
Through my Facebook working team, we posted a photo of our victorious contestants. I called to HE Sao Sokha (President of The Cambodia Football Federation) to find out what rewards had he prepared for them. I also replied to some comments to my Facebook that we reward each footballer USD 1,000 and there were in all 36 of them, including trainers. Later, Minister of Education, Youth and Sports, HE Hang Chuon Naron, proposed to offer an additional amount of Riel 12 million (about USD 3000) each. There were comments to my page that they had not yet received the Riel 12 million reward. HE Hang Chuon Naron then got in and commented in reply that they should wait a week or two because it is the money from the treasury department and not from a private bank.
Facebook for Work Efficiency
That is why I suggested that each ministry and institution must have a team who will follow up all comments and take actions swiftly … it is also a kind of e-government. VOA Facebook was the top “Likes” before. As of yesterday, my Facebook page had surpassed it already. Some pages were nearly one million “likes” behind. However, I am not using Facebook to compete with anyone about popularity. I am using Facebook to serve people better and more efficiently. It is impossible for anyone to cheat me with corrupted information […]
Increase Monthly Allowance for Wives/Children of Officials/Armed Forces
This morning I already responded to a comment that came in yesterday to my Facebook page. Today is the International Women’s Day and there was this suggestion to increase allowance for wives and children of the Royal Government officials and armed forces. I brought to the commenter’s attention that I have delegated the issue to Ministers of Economy and Finance, and Public Functions, to discuss and figure out how to best respond to the need. If we could not do it this year, we would have it done next year. We paid attention to increasing salary for men and women in services but we failed to do so for their wives and children. Though the amount of money for each of them is small, their number is big.
Getting-Together With Cambodian Athletes on 4 April
I anticipate that sports activities must be strong in the near future. I have an idea and I do not know yet if HE Thaong Khon and HE Hang Chuon Naron will agree to it. I think we should have a get-together of all Cambodian athletes from all practices – football, volleyball, Petanque, swimming, etc. from all federations. I would propose the evening of 4 April – my made-up birthday. I am asking Deputy Prime Minister HE Sok An to help look into this preparation. Please do not forget to invite our disable athletes for this event. We may see it as our efforts to get to our common objective in 2023. I will say just a few words and the party will begin.
Golf – “A Sport with Scientific Calculation”
I also continued my sport activity. I could not do football, volleyball or Petanque anymore. I have a waist problem. The fact that I lost some weight I am doing a good swing and have a good long distance driver. Some people placed comments in my page with pictures and said that no one would dare to take ball from me, for example. I told them it was correct because they all thought of safety of a leader and would not just compete for a ball that might cause accident. However, it was only for football. If you play golf, no one would do for you if you do not swing it yourself. Golf is quite scientific. It is not about getting the ball as far as you can put to a hole. You need to have wind calculation – from front, behind, and either side … Those who do not play it would not know how to comment about it […]./.
