The Singapore Underwater Federation (SUF) submitted falsified results for the women’s 4×200 surface relay during the selection process for the 2023 SEA Games, the Singapore National Olympic Council (SNOC) and SportSingapore announced in a joint statement on Mar. 19. The organizations’ statement revealed a committee of inquiry (COI) was convened in July 2024. After it concluded its investigation in February, a police report was filed with the Singapore Police Force on Mar. 18, the day before the announcement.
The SUF oversees all underwater sport activities and competitions in Singapore, including fin swimming, which involves an athlete racing on the water’s surface or underwater wearing mono- or bi-fins. The relay in question comprised of Bernice Ting, Jovita Ho, Jamie Ang, and Vanessa Ong. The team finished fourth out of four teams in the relay final at the 2023 SEA Games.
The Strait Times contacted the SUF about the investigation. The SUF’s former vice-president of sport, Desmond Ho, the father of one of the athletes on the relay, claimed sport manager and coach Faiz Suhaimi submitted the falsified results to the SNOC during the SUF’s attempt to add more fin swimmers to Singapore’s roster for the 2023 SEA Games.
“During the time of the appeal, something went wrong. Everybody started to put the blame on me, because I’m the one who gave them [the sport managers] the results, and then something is wrong.”
Ho stated the federation had originally planned to send the men’s and women’s relay teams to a competition in Malaysia in January 2023 to qualify for the Games. But only the men’s team made the trip to the qualifying competition, with the women staying in Singapore for the inter-varsity Games. Since the women did not attend the qualifying meet, there should not have been a result for them to submit for the appeal process of adding them to the SEA Games roster.
Ho claimed he did not check the results as they were “very short on time” for the appeal submission, claiming, “there was an error that there was a girls’ team included, and the manager just kept it in.”
Ho was informed on Mar. 18 that his National Registry of Coaches swimming license was suspended and told The Strait Times he would wait to see “what’s the process for SNOC.”
For his part, Faiz released a statement with assistant coach Gary Lee and three of the athletes on the relay—Ting, Ang, and Ong. “As this matter is currently under investigation by the Singapore Police Force, we have full confidence in the authorities and trust that the process will be carried out thoroughly and fairly,” they said. “We are committed to cooperating fully with the investigation and respecting its integrity. We firmly believe that, with time, the truth will prevail.”
Channel News Asia followed up with the Ho family, who said that a split in the Singapore fin swimming community after the 2023 SEA Games with Ho and the other coaches started opposing academies, was the reason no unified statement was given.
Jovita Ho told CNA “The four girls who are mentioned are the victims. We did represent the country, and we did do our part.” She said that she had been focused on training and was unaware there was a police investigation until the news broke, assuming the case was closed after she was interviewed as part of SNOC’s investigation last August.
SNOC and SportSingapore told The Strait Times “In this case, the Singapore Underwater Federation had deliberately abused the system, going to the extent of fabricating the results sheet for an event that the athletes did not participate in…the primary responsibility still rests with the associations to ensure that all data submitted is accurate, truthful, and upholds the integrity of the selection process. No system will be able to fully eliminate the risk of false reporting, and SUF had abused the system deliberately and intentionally.”
The organizations continued to highlight the federation’s failure, stating the COI revealed failure within the SUF to report any wrongdoing. Their statement also revealed the SUF had its SNOC membership revoked in December 2023 after its suspension by its international federation “on a separate issue.”
This is not the first time the aquatics world has had to negotiate an investigation into falsified results. In August 2023, World Aquatics handed five-year suspensions to two Uzbek administrators for falsifying Tokyo Olympic qualifying times.
Oh dear, oh dear!!!
gag it…
what on earth