Kuala Lumpur: In an interview uploaded to YouTube on August 21, Indonesia’s 2004 Athens Olympics gold medalist, Taufik Hidayat revealed that he was approached by a Malaysian badminton official 15 years ago, asking him to throw the match against his good friend, Malaysia’s badminton legend – Lee Chong Wei in the 2006 Doha Asian Games semi-final.
That revelation prompted Lee Chong Wei to call Hidayat to find out the details about this incident as Lee had no idea about the matter until Hidayat made it public.
“I know nothing about this, and Taufik has never told me about it. I called him yesterday after this has gone viral, and he told me the person involved in this,” said Lee to Bernama.
“Thankfully, for Taufik and I, our country always comes first instead of personal gain,” added Lee.
Hidayat said that the Malaysian badminton official offered to pay him double the payment of 200 million rupiah (RM60,000) promised by the Indonesian government if he managed to win gold at the Asian Games. Of course, with the condition of losing to Lee Chong Wei in the semi-final.
Here are the videos of Taufik Hidayat’s interview where he talked about the match-fixing that happened in the 2006 Doha Asian Games:
Part I
Part II
“After talking to Taufik, I now know who the person is. It’s been so long since this took place. I don’t want to name or shame anybody, and I believe we should all move on,” said Lee.
Hidayat ultimately defeated Lee Chong Wei 21-16, 21-18 in the semi-finals before beating Lin Dan of China 21-15, 22-20 in the final to win the gold medal.
Meanwhile, a Malaysian media, The Vibes contacted the president of the Badminton Association of Malaysia (BAM) – Norza Zakaria and he said it’s up to the Badminton World Federation (BWF) if it would like to start investigating this matter.
“This incident happened 15 years ago, it’s up to BWF if it wants to start investigating this. BAM will give full cooperation should BWF decide to look into this further,” said Zakaria.
