Almost 8 in 10 not proud of medal won by foreign import: Yahoo! poll

77 per cent of respondents who took part in a recent Yahoo! poll said they would not be proud if a foreign import wins an Olympic medal of Singapore.

On Tuesday, we asked “Would you feel proud if a foreign import wins an Olympic medal for Singapore?”, and respondents had to choose either a “yes” or “no”.

The three-day poll, which ended on Thursday, saw 77 per cent of the 17,227 respondents who took part chose “No”.

On Wednesday, China-born paddler Feng Tianwei won the bronze in the table tennis women’s singles competition, the first time Singapore was awarded an individual Olympic medal in 52 years.

Weightlifter Tan Howe Liang was the last Olympian to win, bagging a silver medal at the 1960 Rome Games.

Yahoo! user Frustrated said in a comment on this story, “Nothing against her, she performed well and deserves all the recognition and applause. But no applause to the “buyer” of medals! Singapore should buy all the Olympics medallists with its huge national reserves. Or better still, set up a factory and manufacture the medals.”

Another commenter, Min, concurred, “If this is a national sport, the sportsperson has to be Singaporean, which means born in and bred in Singapore. He or she can be trained by foreign coaches and he or she will be truly representing Singapore. Again, it does not matter the end result whether he or she wins any games. Importing talent to represent Singapore is cheating.”

However, some Singaporeans stepped up to defend Feng’s win.

“She has given to Singapore more than any of us who are Singaporean only by right of birth. Those of you who are complaining should be ashamed of yourselves. It is not about the origins of the contributor but the contribution to the country,” said Lim.

CYC added, “To me Feng Tian Wei is a Singaporean and her win did us proud. She is better than any Singapore-born citizen. Well done Feng. We love you for fighting so hard to win the bronze medal.”