25th SEA Games, Laos

The Lao Medical Anti-Doping Commission has drafted a manual for drug testing procedures to be used at the 25th SEA Games in Vientiane this year.

Chairman of the commission, Dr Alongkone Phengsavanh said so far the commission is still waiting for funds to publish more than 1,000 manuals to be distributed to countries participating in the games. These include the list of substances that are banned at the competition.

“We also need funds to train about 80 doctors and nurses who will take part in training courses to learn about doping. So far, medical staff have not undertaken any courses,” said Dr Alongkone, who is also a member of the National Olympic Committee of Laos.

He said the work was very important to ensure a fair competition.

All tests will be sent to be analysed in China at a cost of about 3.6 million kip (300 euro) apiece. This money will come from the government budget.

The commission will focus on testing in some sports before the games including muay, boxing and other similar sports.

All tests will be conducted under the SEA Games Federation's guidelines.

The commission will also test all athletes who win gold medals at the games. This is a rule of the federation. The commission will also randomly choose athletes for testing.

If the athlete tests positive, they will have to return any medals they have won and will be disqualified from competition for two years.

Dr Alongkone and his colleagues have already delivered this message, including the list of banned substances to Lao athletes.

Two doctors from Laos , one from Thailand and one from Vietnam will supervise the testing procedures to ensure fairness.

However, Dr Alongkone said the biggest challenge for the anti-doping teams were their lack of previous experience. This will be the first time they will have operated in competition. For this reason, Dr Alongkone said they need to take training on drug testing as soon as possible.


Vientianetimes

Photo: Lao’s Thongmala Viengphane, left, carries the ball against Cambodia during their bronze medal match Tuesday, Dec. 11, 2007, at the 24th Southeast Asian Games in Nakhon Ratchasima, Thailand. Lao defeated Cambodia 15-0 for the bronze medal

(KPL) The rules for the 25th South East Asian Games will be written by representatives of Laos, Malaysia and Singapore, following a meeting of the SEA Games Sports and Rules Committee in Vientiane this week.

The officials will formulate the rules for the competition organising and programmes, which will be presented to SEA Games meeting in November, along with the list of sports to be competed at the event.

Lao SEA Games Sports and Rule Committee Chairman Mr Souvannarath Saignavong said the national sports committee wishes to hold more than 25 sporting events to meet the requests of all countries, but we believe this is impossible to do that.

“Many countries are interested in assisting Laos to host the 25th SEA Games, and believe Laos would be able to host the event successfully,” said Mr. Souvannarath.

Last April’s first SEA Games meeting approved 25 sports for the Vientiane Games.

These include swimming and diving, wrestling, track and field, badminton, rugby, boxing, football, futsal, golf, judo, karatedo, petanque, sepak takraw, billiard and snooker, shooting, muay, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, boat racing, wushu, pencak silat, shuttlecock, volleyball and beach volleyball.