PETALING JAYA: National diving champion Pandelela Rinong said she spoke up against rape jokes and her experience of sexual harassment involving her former coach to raise awaraness and to offer support for other victims to come forward.
Pandelela said she wanted to encourage future victims to speak up, “hoping to encourage (them) to be brave when I wasn’t”.
“I shared my ‘not so nice’ experience to give awareness to the public, and support for victims out there, who are always in a dilemma, whether to speak up or stay silent,” she said in a tweet last night.
“Most importantly, enablers and their backups shouldn’t be glamorised. Others may forget, but not the victim,” she said.
Her tweet came just hours after youth and sports minister Ahmad Faizal Azumu questioned her move to raise allegations of sexual harassment by her former coach now as, he said, the incidents happened “long ago”.
“I am trying to understand why after a long time, Lela (Pandelela) wants to put this out in the social media,” Faizal said.
Pandelela had claimed on Twitter recently that she had to endure a torrent of sexual jokes from one of her coaches for seven years.
She decided to go public on the matter after the story of an actor who had glorified an unaired rape scene on a TV station went viral.
In detailing her torment, she said she told off the coach but he retaliated by “bullying” her, adding that he was later charged with the rape of another athlete.
“My teammates and I could not do anything about his harassment because he was backed by our head coach then,” she had tweeted.
“The moral of the story is we need a good leader who can right what’s wrong instead of turning a blind eye to evil. And those abused must speak up please! Small voices still matter if we are united.”
Faizal urged national athletes to speak up on any form of sexual harassment by reporting them to their parents or authorities.
He said he would be speaking to Khairy Jamaluddin, who helmed the sports ministry when the alleged incidents took place, adding that he had spoken to certain people over the matter to get a clearer picture.-FMT