Hong Kong’s sports groups risk losing funding and the right to represent the city if the directive is not followed.
Hong Kong’s sports associations have been instructed to include “China” in their names, or risk losing funding and the right to represent the city if the directive is not followed.
The sports bodies have been told to comply by July, the Sports Federation and Olympic Committee of Hong Kong, China, told The Washington Post on Friday. Those that do not could lose government funding, which, the city’s Culture, Sports and Tourism Bureau said in an email, is dependent on committee membership.The letter, officials said, was sent to sports organizations in the city this week and was aimed at those that do not have the word “China” in their names, which would include the 109-year-old Hong Kong Football Association and the Hong Kong Rugby Union.
The renaming directive is about more than the words on a jersey. Sports has become a political football in Hong Kong: Its athletes compete as Hong Kong teams, under the Hong Kong flag, even though the former British colony was handed over to Chinese rule in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” framework, which allows the city to maintain its own passports and currency.
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