KUALA LUMPUR – The Malaysian Sepaktakraw Association (PSM) held their extraordinary general meeting (EGM) today and unanimously agreed to amend two articles in their constitution.
Among them is to hold an election of the top leadership via secret ballot instead of by a show of hand, which had been criticised previously.
PSM acting president Datuk Akramuddin Abdul Aziz said a total of 51 representatives (five virtually), representing the 16 affiliates, who attended the EGM today agreed to the amendments.
He added that three state affiliates – Selangor, Sarawak and Putrajaya – as well as Perlis, who have been suspended, did not attend the EGM although invitation letters had been sent to them.
“We also decided that for the posts of president, deputy president, vice-presidents, secretary and treasurer, the candidates can contest in the election although they have not held a post in their state associations for at least one term. Previously, they must have held a post for at least one term at state level before they can contest at the federal level, but this has now been amended.
“The PSM election will be held before next June. I feel that this must be held soonest possible (to elect a new leadership and resolve the crisis faced by PSM),” he said after the EGM at a hotel here today.
He said that if the three state affiliates – Selangor, Sarawak and Putrajaya – wanted to rejoin PSM, they would only need to submit an application letter to the new PSM leadership.
He was also confident that PSM’s conflict with the Asian Sepak Takraw Federation (ASTAF) and their president, Datuk Abdul Halim Kadir, could be resolved once the new leadership was in place and PSM could return to the fold of ASTAF.
On the organisation of the Sepak Takraw League (STL), he said the league would be held at the December or early next year at the latest and with the presence of spectators in stadiums.
The crisis in PSM began in May when ASTAF dropped PSM as an affiliate member with immediate effect while PSM president Datuk Seri Ahmad Ismail was slapped with a 15-year ban following his actions in sending a letter to the Olympic Council of Asia (OCA) and which was copied to the International Olympics Committee (IOC) in his capacity as ASTAF deputy president on Feb 24.
This resulted in 11 state associations pulling out from PSM, saying they had lost faith in his leadership. However, a majority of them rejoined PSM while four other associations are reportedly trying to form the Malaysian Sepaktakraw Federation.
