PUTRAJAYA, March 13 — National athletes should use the government’s concern and focus on their welfare as a driving force for them to maintain their excellence, said National Sports Council (NSC) director-general Datuk Ahmad Shapawi Ismail.

He said the emphasis placed by the government on athletes’ welfare was aimed at ensuring they gave full attention to their training without any outside interference.

In fact, he said athletes should make the new Podium Programme their main target, apart from maintaining the main objective of the previous programme, which was to win the country’s first gold medal in the Olympics.

"We are relieved, especially when we get the government’s attention and sports gets support. We hope the changes taking place will spur the athletes to perform even better.

 "Podium is a key word for athletes because no matter at which level you are, you always want to go for a podium finish...which can be bronze, silver or gold, and surely everyone aims for the gold,” he told reporters after tabling the restructuring of the 2019 national athletes training programme here today.

Ahmad Shapawi said athletes should view the changes as a positive step which needed to be taken as a challenge for them to put up even better performances.

"We provide this welfare package as part of the training programme. So, it is a total training programme which holistically comprises welfare, quality training and management of coaching and training facilities,” he said.

Earlier, Youth and Sports Minister Syed Saddiq Syed Abdul Rahman tabled the restructuring of the national athletes training programme, which retains the name Podium Programme, as well as an additional provision of RM28 million from the government, taking the total allocation for the programme to RM118 million.

Apart from that Syed Saddiq also announced that the latest allowance rates for the 645 full-time and part-time athletes under the 2019 National Athletes Training Allowance Scheme.

Meanwhile, Ahmad Shapawi gave an assurance that the NSC would be able to manage the huge number of athletes, of which 133 are existing Podium Programme athletes; 409 are Kita Juara athletes; and 103 new athletes who have yet to join any programme.

"We definitely have a huge number of athletes, and we once had 1,000 athletes to look after. Now, we have 645 athletes and this number does not include the back-up athletes. From the management perspective, it is not an issue for us,” he said. — Bernama