The SEA Games may be the lowest ranked multi-sports event for the member countries in the region, but winning a gold would still come with handsome cash incentives.
Indonesian gold medallist at the Manila SEA Games will receive a whopping 200 million rupiah (RM58,840). Silver medallist will get 100 million rupiah (RM29,420) while bronze medallists 60 million rupiah (RM17,652).
South East Asian countries still look at the Games as a regional pride and are prepared to break the bank to motivate their athletes.
Singaporean athletes stand to get $10,000 (RM30,480) for each individual gold, $15,000 (RM45,700) for each team event gold and $30,000 (RM91,434) for each team sport gold, with payouts for individual golds capped at three – and $5,000 (RM15,240) for both second and third golds.
However, athletes are required to plough back 20 per cent of their earnings to their respective national sport associations for training and development.
Singapore seems to be the only country that requires the athletes to play their part in developing and promoting other talent with this requirement.
Philippines reward scheme will see their gold medallists receiving P300,000 (RM24,460) while the silver and bronze medallists receive P150,000 (RM12,240) and P60,000 (RM4,900) respectively.
From the P300,000 cash incentive that the Philippine Sports Commission (PSC) will dole out to SEA Games winners, the Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) has promised to double the money for gold-medal performers.
The Filipino esports gold medallists are also expected to receive a windfall of P2,000,000 (RM163,066) for team competition and P1,000,000 (RM81,533) for individual events by their sponsors.
If the Philippines, reach their target of 220 gold medals it would set back both the PSC and the POC by P66,000,000 (RM5,385,624) each just to pay the gold medallists.
In contrast, Malaysian gold medalist will be rewarded with RM20,000 for their first gold medal and RM10,000 for any subsequent fold medals. Under the National Sports Incentive Scheme (Shakam), there are no incentives for silver and bronze medallists.
The National Sports Council (NSC) also rewards those in team sports with less than five players with RM20,000 for gold, while those with more than five would receive RM5,000 per person. National athletes who set any SEA Games records will receive an additional RM1,000.
Malaysian athletes for the KL 2017 SEA Games, received approximately RM3 million in total from the NSC. This was not inclusive of the cash rewards given by respective state governments.
Malaysia had won 145 gold medal in KL and the target in Manila is only 68 gold. If the reduced target is met, the NSC will have to fork out approximately RM1,360,000 as incentives.
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