Anthem guidelines urged after blunder

The "unacceptable" national anthem blunder at a weightlifting event in Dubai last Friday, where a protest song was played instead of March of the Volunteers, could have been intentional, a sports official said.

Speaking on a radio program, the honorary secretary general of the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong, Ronnie Wong Man-chiu, said local sports authorities will take a closer look at the guidelines for playing the national anthem at international events.

He would consider filing complaints to the International Olympic Committee and request international sporting associations to establish clear guidelines at competitions.

Wong refused to accept the apology of the president of the Asian Powerlifting Federation, Farshid Soltani, and the explanation that members of the technical team did not know which anthem should be played for Hong Kong.

"I don't think this is an adequate explanation. When you hire volunteers for international competitions, you have to make sure they have relevant experience," Wong said.

His remarks came despite federation claims that volunteers had confused the audio file of March of the Volunteers provided by the Hong Kong team for another backup file of the protest song mistakenly downloaded from the internet.

Wong claimed that playing the anti-fugitive bill song Glory to Hong Kong instead of the national anthem was not a result of carelessness, but intentional wrongdoing.

"If you were careless, you could have played any other song. Why was it this one?" he said.

Playing a different country's song would have been preferable to the protest song popularized in the 2019 anti-extradition protests in Hong Kong. "To put it bluntly, this was premeditated," Wong said.

Wong also said team representatives should verify whether the anthem is correct with the organizer before the award ceremony.

"I hope the organizers can understand, and require teams to confirm whether the anthem is correct," he said.

An online video of the Asian Classic Powerlifting Championship on Friday showed Glory to Hong Kong being played during Susanna Lin's gold-medal celebration.

After the 15-second mark, Lin was seen making a "T" gesture with her hands to the organizers to indicate "time-out" - one of the measures stipulated by the committee on how athletes should respond in the event of issues with the national anthem and the local flag.

cjames.lee@singtaonewscorp.com