COMMENT | “I do not play golf, it is just that I was asked to be president. As the chairman of the state Islamic action committee, I cannot be there (in the club’s committee).” - Negeri Sembilan Menteri Besar and president of the Seremban International Golf Club (SIGC), Aminuddin Harun

This statement is a reflection of why sports in this country is in the doldrums. It also is a microcosm of the system of political, and sometimes religious, patronage which has become embedded in all facets of our society.

In the first place, no one wanted Aminuddin to be there. For more than 20 years, members had been electing their own president and management committee to manage the club and its affairs. Then came the changes.

In its zeal to exercise “control” over everything and anything, the state government, which owned the land, decreed that it should be the regulator, controller, watchdog of the club’s affairs and, perhaps by extension, the judge of public morals.

Under veiled threats that the lease of the land could be revoked, the members voted to change the club's constitution...